Colm Burke (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I wish to raise the methods the media have adopted regarding the health service. I have raised this previously. Everything that is done in the health service is reported in a very negative way. At 7.30 this morning I attended a presentation on a survey done by MSD. It shows that 39% of the population are very optimistic about our health service, 40% are pessimistic and 20% have no view one way or the other. However, when people are interviewed on how they, themselves, got on within the health service, the vast majority were positive.It is one of the things we now need to do. Many good things are happening in the health service and everyone working in it works very hard. The negative coverage is not helping staff morale in our hospitals and services. It is something with which we need to deal.

In terms of the media, I want to deal with the HPV vaccine. There is a lot of negative coverage of the vaccine, especially on social media. The Leader worked with me last Monday to hold a public meeting. The head of cancer research in the Irish Cancer Society, Dr. Robert O'Connor, made a presentation. Some new 40,000 cancers are identified in this country every year, of which 20,000 are invasive, and 9,000 people die, yet social media now seems to dominate the debate on the HPV vaccine.

Dr. O'Connor will make a presentation at 3 p.m. in the Houses today. I urge people to attend because it is important that we send out a positive message. The vaccine has been monitored over a ten-year period. While some people have suffered adverse effects, the conditions they have do not differ from those who have not received the vaccine. It is important that we send out positive messages and state that the vaccine is available and should be promoted. Social media should not dominate the debate. In a future debate on health, we may consider how we work with people in the health service to make sure that morale is improved. It is one of the problems we have.