Martin Ferris (Kerry North, Sinn Fein)

I wish to seek the adjournment of the Dáil under Standing Order 31 to raise a matter of national importance, namely, the failure of the ambulance services to respond to the request of a terminally ill woman, a mother of eight young children aged between seven and 18, who was being treated for cancer. The woman in question took ill 11 days after the sudden death of her husband and urgently needed to be taken from her home in Cahirciveen, County Kerry, to Cork University Hospital. As a result of the urgency of the situation and the unavailability of an ambulance to take the woman from Tralee to Cork, her family were left with no option but to transfer her in the back of a van for approximately 55 miles over substandard roads until an ambulance travelling from Macroom eventually took her to Cork. The woman died last week, leaving eight children orphaned. This House needs to discuss the failure of the Tánaiste and Minister for Health and Children to provide medical services for people in need.

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