Mick Barry (Cork North Central, Solidarity) | Oireachtas source

This Sunday a 34 year old mother will leave her home in Wilton in Cork city and travel up to Dublin. On Monday she will head out to the airport and take the 7.50 a.m. Ryanair flight to Barcelona. Her name is Noreen O'Neill. She is the mother of a two year old boy, Michael, her first and only child. Michael will not be going on the trip as flying is not good for him. He was born with bilateral frontal polymicrogyria, a drug-resistant epilepsy. The condition caused Michael to suffer up to 20 convulsions per day before he even reached his first birthday.

The Irish health service offered Noreen ten different anti-convulsive medications for Michael but, unfortunately, none of them worked. In January of this year Noreen began treating Michael with cannabidiol, CBD oil, which served him well and for four full months he was seizure free. When the seizures returned in the summer Noreen increased Michael's CBD dosage. He is now at maximum dosage but the seizures, far fewer than before the treatment began, have not gone away. Noreen tried to get a licence for tetrahydrocannabinol, THC, under the licensing system introduced by the Minister for Health, Deputy Harris. However, each one of the three neurologists she approached declined to apply for the licence, which left Noreen with two choices: watch her son stay gripped by seizures, as they possibly worsen, or go to Barcelona. Barcelona is the home of the Kalapa Clinic, which has been overseeing Michael's CBD dosage in recent months via Skype. It is at the Kalapa Clinic that Michael's first prescription dosage of THC is now being made up. Noreen O'Neill will fly back into Dublin Airport at midday next Wednesday with enough THC to last Michael until the end of January.

Does the Tánaiste feel any sense of shame that he is a Minister in a Government which forces Irish women to go abroad for healthcare for their children? Does he accept the very fact Noreen has to make this journey is a sign that the licensing arrangement is at best inadequate and falling short for many people? Will the customs officials take Noreen to one side next Wednesday and confiscate her child's medicine? Does the Tánaiste agree that the law should not be an ass and must change so as to provide for the healthcare needs of the population and to prevent this kind of situation from happening in future?

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