Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

First, it is not true for anyone to suggest that GPs or many medical bodies oppose this decision. For example, my Department negotiated the provision of the repeat free smear test with the Irish Medical Organisation. We agreed a fee with the organisation. We paid GPs to provide this test and the Deputy agrees with me on this. Had we not done that, we would have had a situation where women who could afford the repeat smear test would have got it and women who could not would not have been reassured. This was one of the top queries coming in to the CervicalCheck helpline, with women stating they did not want to wait for their next date to come around and they would like the reassurance. The Deputy is entirely correct. That led to a significant number of additional women taking that test, many of whom got reassurance. It also obviously added to a backlog.

Long before we received that letter, and consistently, the HSE had been working to try to identify more capacity. Its first priority was to ensure the continuation of the screening, which is not something we could take for granted. We came within hours of not having laboratories provide screening. Once that was done, the next focus was rightly on trying to find additional capacity. They are working hard on that. I hope they can make some progress on it. I expect to receive the capacity report shortly.

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