Dáil debates

Wednesday, 8 March 2006

Lourdes Hospital Inquiry: Statements (Resumed).

 

5:00 pm

Photo of Arthur MorganArthur Morgan (Louth, Sinn Fein)

I welcome Judge Harding Clark's report. I particularly welcome the frankness of the report. It is clear that Judge Harding Clark did not pull any punches in constructing the report and outlined the case elaborately. It unveils a nightmare that will torment families and women, in particular, in the whole north east region for many decades. The report refers to a culture of authoritarianism in Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital, to which all Deputies from the region can attest through representations they have made.

I want to address the issue of symphysiotomy because there are no public representatives from the area who will not have dealt with the issue. This is a process whereby the gynaecologist would have sawn through the pelvis of the patient to widen the birth canal. This practice was introduced around 1920 and was supposed to have ended in 1960. However, in the case of Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital, it was still the practice in 1983. People knew this was going on and turned a blind eye. Others should have known it was going on. We talk about examples of bad practice. This is an example of something close to what went on in Bergen-Belsen Prison, which was going on just up the road. While the Department of Health and Children knew about the practice and the consequences of it for five or six years, together with successive Ministers for Health, it did absolutely nothing about it. There were one or two token meetings with the survivors of this symphysiotomy procedure, the representative group for the women victims of this brutal process but, unfortunately, nothing practicable has been done to deal with the issue. There has been much hand-wringing at senior level within the Department and at ministerial level over the Neary case, but what about the victims of the people who carried out symphysiotomies on these women? These women will be on morphine for the rest of their lives. They will be barely able to move about or walk. In some instances, people are already wheelchair bound or will be shortly, yet the Department and the Minister are doing nothing to meet the needs of these women.

On 18 June 2003, I received a letter from the chairperson of the competent authority, the Institute of Public Obstetricians and Gynaecologists. It reads as follows:

In view of the considerable disquiet expressed by both the elected representatives and the media, I believe that all the clinical details, or as many as possible, should be sought about these cases, and with this data, the women should be given full explanation by an informed medical practitioner as to what happened to them. They are certainly entitled to that.

This was in 2003 and nothing significant has happened to-date, which is a scandal.

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