Taoiseach Micheál Martin has hit out at the HSE and Children's Health Ireland (CHI) and said funding is no longer an excuse and they should "get on with it and get it done" in relation to tackling children's waiting lists.
Mr Martin said he intends to meet with CHI, which governs the children's hospitals in Dublin, and the HSE in relation to waiting times for children who require urgent surgery.
Mr Martin was responding to Sinn Féin leader Mary Lou McDonald during Leaders' Questions in the Dáil on Wednesday, who raised the case of Ava Cahill (11) who is waiting to receive corrective surgery to address spina bifida for more than a year and a half.
Ms McDonald said 90,000 children are on some form of waiting list and many with spina bifida wait between one and four years for orthopedic surgery and called for funding to be released immediately.
“Funding is not an excuse any longer,” Mr Martin said. “Record sums of money have been given to the health service executive, the CHI ,they should get on with it and get it done.”
He said it was “not acceptable” for children to wait so long for urgent surgery and that €350 million has been made available for improving waiting lists this year.
Mr Martin said he wanted to meet with the HSE and CHI to get a “proper assessment” in terms of “actual waiting times” for children and how long individual children are waiting and the reasons for that.
‘A failure’
Ms McDonald said some children have waited so long for orthopedic surgery "that they are now inoperable". The Dublin Central TD said due to the wait some have experienced, "children who once walked independently are now in wheelchairs".
“This is a failure of vulnerable children. Time is of the essence, the longer these children wait for surgical intervention, the more complex procedures they eventually need,” she said.
“The wait is ruining their chance and their right to a normal life, free of pain. It’s not good enough for them to be simply let be.”
The Sinn Féin leader said the Taoiseach “didn’t actually need” long rounds of meetings “to understand what’s happening”.
She described Ava Cahill’s situation, who lives in “considerable and daily pain” because her “feet have turned in on themselves and her condition is worsening”.
“Ava says it’s increasingly difficult for her to do everyday things. Her feet keep getting caught in her pants as she dresses herself and she doesn’t want anyone to see her feet,” Ms McDonald said.
“Ava, like every child, simply wants to do things that her friends do and she so badly needs this operation because she says ’it will make my feet straight and I can tell people that my feet are normal’.”
