Barry Andrews (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)

Four years ago, the debate on health was all about consultants' contracts, primary care teams and waiting lists for treatment. We have made huge progress on all these issues. The one major indicator of improvements in our health service is that the average lifespan is over 80, way ahead of the European average. We have made major progress on this over the years, which is down in large part to the reforming zeal of the Minister, Deputy Harney. Only today, I read in the newspaper that treatments for day-care patients are up by 40%. We are getting people through our hospitals much quicker. We are making beds available in that way through reform and that was recorded today. Has there been a word about this in the House, or do we have to listen to this hysteria about us not caring about the deaths of young children?

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