Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)

The €600 cost per child of the vaccination referred to by the Minister this morning on "Morning Ireland" is dishonest. That the Minister and the Health Service Executive are seriously considering a cost of €600 per girl for the three-stage vaccine is not only dishonest, it is incompetent. The Minister's figure is approximately €115 and 21% VAT per vaccine shot, with three shots of the vaccine, amounting to approximately €400. There are then costs of administration by doctors and HSE overheads of another €200 approximately per girl.

The Minister must know that for these sorts of costs, she could offer every girl a medical card for the year. This is meant to be a national vaccination programme and is actually only deliverable as such. The only way to implement a national vaccination programme is through a school or health clinic structure on a mass basis.

If the Minister was to roll out a national scheme, the two vaccine suppliers could be negotiated with and the costs would be significantly less. I understand that in other countries it is about a third of the Minister's indicative costs. The programme and vaccine doses would be supervised by doctors but more likely administered by nursing practitioners. Is the Minister seriously suggesting GPs should be paid for three visits at approximately €50 per time? That is crazy. No wonder the HSE is in a financial black hole if this is the kind of health economics which the Minister has come up with.

Given her long experience as a Minister, I am surprised Deputy Harney has so comprehensively had the wool pulled over her eyes. The Minister delayed this programme for a year to allow a cost-benefit analysis to be done by HIQA. If these are the figures produced by the authority, somebody there should stand down. If the Minister is attempting to stand over these figures, she should consider standing down herself. I know at the weekend the Progressive Democrats are likely to be stood down and her mandate in this Government will be at an end.

Some 70 women a year die, usually in great pain, from different types of cervical cancer. Many of us know friends or family who have died from this disease. The young girls relevant to this scheme would get the disease years to come; I hope it will be long after our time. There is a thought that 70, 80 or 100 of today's girls, along with their future families and children, will go through suffering for absolutely rubbish economics. If the Minister has come up with these economics, perhaps the whole Government should resign.

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