Ms Ava Battles:

Before we deal with that topic, I want to reiterate what Ms Rogers said about the multidisciplinary team. A person needs an early diagnosis and that is vital. However, I reiterate that such a person will go back into the community and will need the multidisciplinary approach which includes occupational therapists, physiotherapists, speech and language therapists and neuropsychologists. Neurologists were like hen's teeth when I started working in the sector and now we have 34. That is great but it is ridiculous that somebody might wait a year to get a diagnosis. There is much that can happen to somebody's underlying condition in a year.

I will reference the issue about access to medicines. I will not speak specifically about Spinraza but I want to reference the issue of access to medicines. We believe that people should have access to the right treatment at the right time. There is a body of international evidence to show that people should be diagnosed early and treated appropriately. In Ireland, we have an issue with access to new medications. Someone who was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, MS, 20 years ago would have been sent home, told to rest and given nothing. Thankfully, neurologists now have a suite of 15 or 16 disease-modifying therapies at their disposal but new medications are coming on-stream all the time. The difficulty is that people cannot access them because they are not getting through the current system. I reiterate what Ms Rogers said earlier about the Medical Research Charities Group and the Irish Platform for Patients Organisations, Science and Industry stressing that we need to look at how that system is currently not working and how people get access to it. The important thing is to keep people well, participating and contributing to society because the more we do that, the better it is for everybody. I wanted to make those comments.