Dr. Michael Byrne:

I wish to explain the circumstances surrounding the decision to postpone the roll-out of the programme and to clear up the apparent link between the morning-after pill and adrenaline, of which there is none. In establishing the programme in University College Cork, we developed a working group comprising Professor Hourihane, myself, an expert from the school of pharmacy and other stakeholders. We sought legal opinion from our office of corporate legal affairs and entered into correspondence with the Department of Health to give the two medical directors comfort around what would be a very new development, the provision of a prescription-only medicine by a layperson to a person for whom it had not been prescribed, albeit in what would be a Good Samaritan situation.
Until the point of going live with it we were getting what was at best neutral support and might even have been interpreted as less than neutral. The eve of going live coincided with the occasion when the morning-after pill was suddenly to become dispensable by pharmacists. If members recall the events around that incident, other vested interests expressed considerable concern that pharmacists could suddenly dispense the morning-after pill and objections were made nationally around that. That gave us both cause for concern that if a health care professional, for whom there was an obvious indication for a drug that they had under their control, was going to be prevented from dispensing something that was necessary, we were unlikely to get support if a first responder under our direction gave adrenaline to a person for whom it had not previously been prescribed. In view of this we voluntarily suspended and then entered a three-year period of correspondence with committees and the Department of Health. We have not managed to get a clear instruction as to what our personal liability would be or whether we could continue with the programme. That is why we suspended it and why it remains in abeyance. In essence we were looking for comfort that a prescription-only medicine could be administered under a controlled programme. This is on a pilot basis with a world expert and a community that has a proven track record of delivering in this type of situation that a prescription-only medicine could be administered by a layperson to someone in extremis. We have already heard it is a medication which in essence can do no harm in the vast majority of cases.
That is the context in which we suspended. These are particular university-setting high-risk vulnerable people who will not come forward and admit they have an allergy. We think we have the perfect environment to test run. We would be ready to go in the morning if we could get the comfort we need.