Joe Flaherty (Longford-Westmeath, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I think we will all agree that it was well worth waiting until 10.15 p.m. tonight for that good news. After that good news I almost feel I should move constituency to Donegal. There is at least 1% of the Donegal population who will probably view that as better news than Jim McGuinness returning as team manager. It is excellent news and I applaud the Minister of State for her work on this to date. The HSE has obviously decided to allow the drug based on a managed access protocol. I know when they started using the current drug it was limited to nine people and phased in over a similar length of time.

If we can see the same progress, initiative and conviction behind the roll-out of this drug, it will be very positive. It is probably unique that we have a rare disease like this. Ironically, this particular variant of it was only first discovered in Ireland in about 1986. Affected patients have a 50% chance of passing on the genetic susceptibility to their children. Until recent times, many people with amyloidosis were misdiagnosed as having heart disease due to other more common symptoms such as high blood pressure. It is getting late in the evening, but I will finish with a little bit of history. A 1995 study of the County Donegal cases found that nearly all those affected were direct descendants of a man called Conall Gulban. His descendants subsequently founded what we now know as Tír Chonaill or Donegal. It is timely as we come up to St. Patrick's Day that we should note that Conall Gulban was, in fact, a son of Niall of the Nine Hostages, who became the first nobleman to convert to Christianity. With a mix of good news for the patients affected and a solemn burst of history, I will finish up on that. I thank the Minister of State for that good news.

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