Niall Ó Donnghaile (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Cuirim fáilte roimh an Aire Stáit. The Minister of State is welcome. I appreciate that this is obviously a very busy period for him and his Government colleagues, not least the Minister for Health. In such circumstances, I understand that the Minister cannot be available to be with us this afternoon.

It is fair to say we can all can see that the best elements of our health care services work best when they work together, in particular when they work in a unified way and deliver good, positive health care for people right across the island, in all of our Thirty-two Counties. That is demonstrable in paediatric cardiac services where children from the North are able to avail of a world class service here in Dublin and in the cross-Border cancer care provision provided by Altnagelvin Hospital, which has seen significant investment from the Executive and, indeed, from the Government here as well.

This issue came to my attention from talking to work colleagues here in Leinster House who were resident in the North or in Britain, and who, perhaps, formally tried to donate blood here in the State or wanted to do so upon coming home, but found that, because they were resident in either the North or Britain, were unable to donate blood because of the variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, CJD, crisis, which we all remember as mad cow disease or BSE. What I am asking is, given the positive understanding we have of cross-border co-operation and the identifiable need for additional blood donations in this jurisdiction, whether consideration can be given to reviewing that ban with a view, ultimately, to lifting it and also, given the passage of time, if there is now scientific and medical evidence that points towards freeing up such people. A number of the people who said this to me are actually Members of the other House, including Deputies Quinlivan and Ó Broin, who was a Belfast city councillor during that period, and Senator Conway-Walsh, who is our group leader in the Seanad and who was working in Britain at the time. All of them would wish to step up and heed the call from the Minister, the Government and the Department.