Michael Harty (Clare, Independent)
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Before we move on, regarding Sharon's case, which was the basis of the MacCraith report, one of her problems in respect of communication was that she had her smear test before Christmas. When she had not received her results by the beginning of April, she contacted CervicalCheck. It did not communicate with her despite her making several contacts with it. It was only when she threatened to go to the media on 6 June that the Department of Health responded to ask for her details. No action was taken between the beginning of April and the beginning of June regarding getting her results. At that time, nobody was aware that there was an IT glitch, at least not in the public domain. Her problem was that despite contacting CervicalCheck at the beginning of April, the first meaningful response was on 6 June when she threatened to go to the media. It took another three weeks, I understand, for her GP to get the report of her testing, which all revolved around HPV secondary testing.