Eugene Murphy (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I know that when kids are young and they get sick, parental instinct should never be overlooked. I was glad to hear Dr. Martin mention that earlier because parental instinct is important to me. We all have to accept that the medical people are the experts but maybe parental instinct is not always taken into account and something that should have been treated on day one goes into day two. Sadly we have the loss of life of a little girl as a result, which caused great grief to the parents and all left behind. Do we get involved with parents enough and take enough account of parental instinct? I will not mention any case but I hear back from these people is that on the first evening, while the hospital tried to help out, it did not seem to be on top of it. On evening two, the parents will say that it was colossal and that a great many people were involved in trying to save the child. Sadly it was too late. There might be a feeling out there that parental instinct should be at the top of the list when people arrive at a hospital in this situation, particularly a child with a disability who is not able to tell their parents or anybody else they have a sore throat, pain or whatever.