Shónagh Ní Raghallaigh (Kildare South, Sinn Fein)

I thank the courageous women in the Gallery who have bravely shared their stories with us today and over recent months. Women have been forced to travel abroad due to the neglectful health system in this State. It is a system that has told young girls to get pregnant to stop their periods, allowed their mothers to go into debt seeking treatment abroad and referred our women to mental health services instead of gynaecological ones because it is "all in their head". It is a system that allows women to go into septic shock on the floor of a hospital waiting room, all while there are start-of-the-art facilities available across Europe.

A constituent in south Kildare wrote to me recently. Like so many other women, when Sheena first made contact with our health system because of excruciating pain, she was told it was normal. Her experience was dismissed outright. After seeing four specialists and paying €3,000 out of pocket, she finally got a diagnosis. In that time, she had to leave work and on numerous occasions, her partner and children looked on helpless and sick with worry. She was left in the dark by doctors about a string of other related symptoms. The only insight and guidance she received was from women like herself in online forums. She counts herself as one of the lucky ones.

Another constituent endured nine IVF procedures and two miscarriages before receiving treatment abroad. Yet another constituent emailed me just today to tell me she waited 20 years for her diagnosis. This is absolutely shameful. We need to take a long hard look at ourselves and the system of care we provide women in this State. Women are told to put up and shut up by a system indifferent to their suffering. It is high time we started taking women’s pain and women’s health seriously. We have a horrifying track record in this respect, stretching back to the foundation of the State. It is a living history, with the recent collective trauma of the cervical check scandal hanging over mná na hÉireann, along with a litany of other injustices, including HRT shortages, lack of proper menopause care and ADHD misdiagnoses. There is a moral question that must be deeply considered. For just how long is this Government willing to let women suffer? Women with endometriosis are simply in too much pain to fight this fight alone. Tá sé in am infheistíocht cheart a dhéanamh i gcúram sláinte na mban in Éirinn. Ní féidir linn neamhaird a dhéanamh ar a bhfulaingt a thuilleadh.

See this speech in context