Niamh Smyth (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I wish to raise the issue of women's healthcare. We learned this week that both BreastCheck and CervicalCheck were paused for the month of April. That is understandable in terms of the pandemic we find ourselves in, with the requirements for social distancing, PPE and all of that to be taken into consideration. Equally, we have to consider the thousands of women who have missed out on that all-important screening. Will the Minister outline to us today a comprehensive plan for how a catch-up will be carried out for the women who have missed out? In terms of figures, I understand no mammograms were done in April, as opposed to 13,000 in the same month last year. In the case of CervicalCheck, only a couple of hundred screenings were carried out, as opposed to 21,000 in April last year. In addition, we have heard reports of women waiting up to six months for their CervicalCheck screening result to come back. These are high-risk women and we do not want a repeat of what happened before with CervicalCheck. Will the Minister offer a response today that will give the women of Ireland some comfort in terms of how we are going to catch up with all of these missed screenings?

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