Anne Rabbitte (Fianna Fail)

I raise the issue of Portiuncula hospital and the moving of high-risk pregnancy and antenatal care from Portiuncula to University Hospital Galway or to the Midlands hospital in Portlaoise. While I understand that we must put the care and protection of the mum and the baby and the risk elimination front and centre at all times, it is important that I also raise that we were in this situation in 2018. A report in 2018 identified an awful lot of the same issues then as were raised yesterday by the Saolta group. I have my concerns as to why we have found ourselves back here again. I have concerns regarding the capacity of other hospitals to be able to cater and support high-risk pregnancies and antenatal care. I also have a query. If all the critical cases and high-risk care are removed, what is the capacity to retain the staff to ensure their skills are kept up while the review is ongoing? At the same time, in terms of what fell short in 2018 in relation to governance and oversight, I have to query where the governance and oversight from the clinical side fell down on this particular case.

The programme for Government commits to a review of the maternity strategy. I would like to hear from the Minister as to where we are going with the maternity strategy. When will it be brought forward to be reviewed? I also acknowledge the support of the Minister for Portiuncula in the past six months since she came into office. There are critical concerns and a lot of upset today on our side of the county.