Martin Kenny (Sligo-Leitrim, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

If the Minister was listening to "Morning Ireland" this morning, he will have heard a constituent of mine, Jennifer, speak about what her ten-year-old child, Maggie, is going through. Maggie suffered from cancer as an infant and recovered from it. She suffers from an intellectual disability. She had been using CAMHS and was finding it difficult and hard to manage. Over a year ago, or almost 18 months ago now, CAMHS stated she needed to be under a mental health intellectual disability team. However, there is no mental health intellectual disability team in CHO 1. I understand there are only four teams in the country and people cannot move between them. I raised this with the Tánaiste over a year ago and have raised it several times here, and Jennifer has now raised the matter publicly on the national airwaves. We need the Government to step in to ensure the affected children and their parents can have some hope of getting assistance. Jennifer stays awake all night on many nights and is not able to manage. If she needs medication, she cannot have it prescribed unless she is with one of the teams, but the State refuses to give her one.

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