Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

-----and to suggest they are now champions for women's health is utter hypocrisy.

On the two issues referenced by the Deputy, the HPV testing is an important shift to make because, as Deputies will know, Dr. Scally very usefully in his report states that for every 1,000 women who are screened, 20 will have cell changes and the standard screening programme we use now will detect those cell changes in approximately 15 women but, sadly, will miss it in about five. From memory, when we moved to HPV testing the number will go from 15 to 18. There will always be false negatives but it will reduce the number of cell changes that are missed.

I have not made a decision on this yet, nor have I the information I need, on how we will configure our laboratory use with regard to what we do here and in other jurisdictions. As far as I know, before we make that move we will have to procure for these matters. The Deputy is correct it will require less cytology but it will not require no cytology. Some people will still be referred. There is an opportunity to look at all of these issues. I do not believe the Deputy is saying this, in fairness, but I do not believe outsourcing is at the heart of what happened here. Perhaps the Deputy does believe this but I do not, based on Dr. Scally's evidence. The Deputy is correct that some of the laboratories have different accreditations. There was certainly not proper oversight, and there is no doubt of this from reading Dr. Scally's report. He did find they are still safe for us to use for our screening programme.

Did I leave out a question?

See this speech in context