Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

But we will simply be recognising a reality that for the past 35 years has been in the shadows whereby many women have to keep their stories secret and we send them abroad to get basic healthcare needs.

In terms of confidence in both screening systems and vaccinations, it is important to say that if one looks at CervicalCheck and BreastCheck, by international standards we have very high uptakes. A total of 80% of Irish women have used CervicalCheck while about 74% of Irish women participate in BreastCheck. Those figures are high by international standards and we need to maintain that. This is why in the response to the CervicalCheck scandal, we have prioritised looking after victims of that scandal first and foremost. We are absolutely committed to exposing what happened fully, who made the decisions and when so that we learn lessons in terms of full accountability. On the back of that, we want to ensure that we build confidence in this system in the future so that we can ensure that Irish people get the full benefit of screening programmes as indeed they should from vaccination programmes where people should listen to their doctor rather than what they might read on social media on the impact of vaccinations.

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