Bríd Smith (Dublin South Central, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

I just got off the phone in the last hour to a couple in my constituency who have a diagnosis at 22 weeks of a fatal foetal anomaly. They have a two-and-a-half-year-old child and, at a multidisciplinary team meeting this morning, they were refused a termination on the grounds of fatal foetal anomaly because it is "impossible", in the words of Marie O'Shea, who spoke to the health committee in October, to say how long that baby will live if it survived birth. Despite this we have a clause, section 11, in the legislation that will not allow for doctors to recommend a termination in very tragic circumstances. This is a baby with one enlarged kidney covered in cysts with no amniotic fluid around its body and the mother is suffering in pain. She will be forced to travel to Liverpool and she was told to bring her two-and-a-half-year-old with her if she cannot get care. I cannot believe the cruelty going on in our hospitals at the moment and I am really pleading-----

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