Marie Sherlock

I too must raise the report from Children's Health Ireland, CHI, today. There are one to two e-scooter-related incidents presenting to emergency departments every single day, with a 50% increase in traumatic brain injuries over the past 12 months. As we rise today, I have to ask how in all conscience we can walk away from here, knowing that every day for the next eight weeks, a child is going to b…

I move: “That the Bill be now read a Second Time.” We in the Labour Party passionately believe that we need to have a serious overhaul of how waste is collected and regulated across every county in this country. In that context, I am very proud to see our Labour Party Bill proceed to Second Stage in the Dáil today. The Bill is the Waste Management (Single Household Waste Collection Service) Bill …

In the spirit of solidarity, as a proud Corkonian who is very proud to now call Dublin home, I extend my support to Mayo as well. They might just do it this time round. I thank all those who came to support the Bill today, including Deputies Ivana Bacik, Mark Ward, Gary Gannon, Paul McAuliffe and Roderic O'Gorman. It is very clear that while we may all have a slight difference in emphasis about wh…

I want to thank my colleague, Deputy Kenny, for bringing forward this really important motion and welcome the support across the Opposition. He does appear to be getting to some Deputies in Sinn Féin. No one wants to be talking about going back to school but the back-to-education allowance has landed this week and many parents are having to deal with an existing cost-of-living crisis. It beggars …

I move amendment No. 1: In page 3, between lines 13 and 14, to insert the following: “(a) by the insertion of the following subsection after subsection (1): “(1A) The Minister shall, not later than 12 months after the coming into operation of this subsection, and every year thereafter, prepare and lay before each House of the Oireachtas a report on progress towards making contraception services…

I thank the Minister. I feel very strongly that in bringing forward amendment No. 2, and I have listened carefully to the Minister's response, that judgment should not be passed on why a 16-year-old girl might present to a pharmacy seeking contraception. It would be very worrying if the message were to go out that we are trying to control or dissuade behaviours. The history of our State has been t…

I move amendment No. 2: In page 3, between lines 17 and 18, to insert the following: “(b) in subsection (6), by the substitution of “16 years” for “17 years”,”.

88. Deputy Marie Sherlock asked the Minister for Health to commit to setting out a written detailed response and implementation plan to each of the 161 recommendations of the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Drugs Use policy reform. [52314/26]

As the Minister of State knows, the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Drugs Use published a report two weeks ago. It is a detailed report, with 161 detailed recommendations set out over 134 pages. I have to convey to the Minister of State the deep dismay and disappointment caused by her comments in response to the report some 24 hours after its publication. Will the Department of Health issue a detai…

I thank the Minister of State. That is certainly very welcome. I say genuinely to the Minister of State and the senior Minister in the Department that there is a real opportunity to show leadership and to prove their credentials by getting things done with regard to this particular issue. Our committee heard hundreds of hours of evidence from 82 witnesses since April last year. It was an incredibl…

That to me is wrong. The reality is the issues are way too serious for that. There were 343 drug-induced deaths in our country in 2022. That is the latest available data. Over 80% of those in our prisons have addiction. Look at our communities. We need to change how we do things on drugs. To be honest, the Minister of State rejecting one of the recommendations less than 24 hours after publication …

A health referral and health diversion scheme was promised back in 2017, so we are almost ten years waiting for that. The reality is the Minister of State is fundamentally misunderstanding why we have recommended decriminalisation. It is not an end in itself. Depenalisation is to ensure that we breakdown the stigma and shame of addiction in this country. It is to ensure that people can access serv…

94. Deputy Marie Sherlock asked the Minister for Health the action she is taking to address the dearth of nursing home beds and increase the number of step-down facilities in response to the crisis in delayed transfers of care in our acute hospital system; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [52270/26]

My question relates to delayed transfers of care and nursing home capacity. I understand that yesterday marked the highest number of delayed transfers of care across our acute hospitals in the year to date, with 555 patients who should have been discharged and were not. This marks 86 continuous days of over 500 delayed transfers of care in our hospitals. For the first four months of this year, alm…

The average waiting time in DTOC is 24.8 days across all acute hospitals and in the midlands and north-east Dublin it is more than 30 days. This is a huge cause for alarm in terms of risk to the patients themselves and their prospects of recovery but also the cost to the hospital. We know that nursing home demand is the biggest driver of this, with more than 1,500 people waiting for a nursing home…

Obviously, there are a whole range of issues as to why people do not leave hospital. Almost 70% of the cases relate to a need for residential care or complex care such as dementia. The big issue is the cost. We know the HSE is running a significant deficit at the moment. It will not even make the savings it is supposed to make at the end of this year. We know the cost of an acute daybed is about €…

99. Deputy Marie Sherlock asked the Minister for Health the reason the national lipoedema working group is proposing to exclude surgical intervention from its guidelines on the management of lipoedema; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [52269/26]

My question concerns lipoedema. It is a condition experienced by an estimated 11% of women in this country. We understand a working group was set up in 2023 and was due to report in the second quarter of this year. We have not seen it yet. When will we see that report? I raise significant concern about the outcome of the report, in that the HSE has indicated it relates only to diagnosis and non-su…

Many in the medical community with expertise in this area are of the view that specialised sparing liposuction surgery - there is big distinction from other types of cosmetic liposuction - is the only intervention that can directly address the pathological adipose tissue issues. Many women have to travel to Cyprus and other countries to access those surgical interventions. Serious consideration ha…

I will be sharing time with my colleague, Deputy Lawlor. I pay tribute to the work of the Alzheimer Society of Ireland in its many years of fighting for this cause. I also pay tribute to my colleague, Deputy George Lawlor, who is co-chair of the Oireachtas working group on Alzheimer's disease. I warmly welcome Jordan and Cian Adams, who we had the pleasure of meeting earlier today. I have been bow…

We welcome this Bill. The free contraception scheme launched in 2022 was ground-breaking at the time but access to it has been an issue. In that regard, it is most welcome that prescription rights have been extended to pharmacists by this legislation. The other critical thing is that for all those women not eligible for the free contraception scheme - and I will talk about that in a minute - it wi…

I join Deputy Geoghegan in raising these concerns. The question has to be asked at this stage as to what it will take for the Government to respond to what is a very real crisis among the communities I represent and many other communities across this country. This is literally a life-or-death issue, or, many times, a fate almost as bad as death in terms of the horrendous acquired brain injuries th…

I find the reply we have been given deeply upsetting. This is not directed towards the Minister of State, but to the authors, the Department officials and the senior Ministers. It reflects no recognition of the crisis out there. The reality is that we can have all the powers we want in the world but if there is no enforcement, there is no point in having those powers. This is what is happening in…

On the point that An Garda Síochána has full powers, I know from talking to gardaí on the ground locally in Dublin North Central that they are very active in seizing scramblers and I urge them to seize e-scooters as well. The fundamental issue is that challenging a person under 18 has become a bit of a no-go area for many in An Garda Síochána because of the consequences if that child is injured. T…

I very much welcome this very important motion and thank Deputy Quaide and the Social Democrats for it. I start by paying tribute to the Before We Die campaign, particularly Tony and Susan Murray, Alan and Vera Hughes and the thousands of other parents across the country who have had to tell their stories, lay their lives bare and tell the story of their children in order to advocate for others. …