Fintan Warfield (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister of State, Deputy Jim Daly, for coming to the House. I wish to talk about sexual health. In 2016 HIV transmission rates in the State rose to more than 500 new cases in a year for the first time this century. We are going in completely the opposite direction to our European counterparts. As part of the Department of Health's national sexual health strategy from 2015 to 2020 two of the key recommendations were to develop and implement guidelines for the appropriate use of antiretroviral therapy in HIV prevention.

We must ask what is driving the increase in HIV rates because it is not due to those who know their status it is due to terrible sexual education in schools, poor access to services and a lack of availability of PrEP, pre-exposure prophylaxis. I was in Baggot Street clinic last night. The place is condemned. Paint is falling off the walls. One is required to go to the bathroom to conduct part of the test but the lights are not working in the bathroom. It is not a pleasant place for a sexual health service to be located, although it is quite a good service.

As the Minister of State is aware, PrEP has been hailed as a step forward in the fight against HIV and it is the most suitable response to the HIV crisis we are in at the moment. Two years on from the launch of the high profile strategy the PrEP working group is assessing PrEP for HSE availability and it recently announced that it was conducting a cost-benefit analysis of Truvada. Last week in the High Court Gilead lost an injunction case which will allow generic manufacturers to produce PrEP and provide it to Irish users, but the drug will need to be assessed by the HSE. My question is about if and when it will happen. As I indicated, 500 new cases of HIV are being loaded onto an already stretched health service every year. The longer that goes on the more embarrassing it is for Ireland and the longer it goes on the further we will fall behind our European counterparts. Not only are we not being proactive in tackling the issue we are literally stopping people buying the drug online as it is being picked up by Customs at ports. I urge the Minister, Deputy Harris, to speak publicly about sexual health. His silence has gone on for too long.