Women suing the State over inaccurate cervical cancer screening tests will not be dragged through the courts.

Senior health service officials have been ordered to identify and inform within the next 48 hours the 206 women who were wrongly told they did not have cervical cancer, amid fears over the fallout from the scandal.

The Tánaiste Mary Coughlan has described as "shabbiness" the fact that almost 58,000 X-rays were never looked at by a radiologist in Tallaght hospital in Dublin for nearly five years.

THE elderly doctor at the centre of a fresh cancer misdiagnosis scandal is still registered to practice in both Ireland and Britain.

THE Health Service Executive has become an “organisational shambles” and “completely dysfunctional”, the opposition said last night.

The Minister for Health Mary Harney has said the anxiety and distress caused to women at the centre of the Portlaoise cancer misdiagnosis scandal should never have happened.

The Health Service Executive has promised to appoint an independent expert to review how the organisation handled the Portlaoise cancer scandal.

The Irish Countrywoman's Association has today offered a free counselling service to women affected by the latest cancer scandal in Portlaoise.

The cancer misdiagnosis scandal at Portlaoise Hospital is expected to dominate today's weekly meeting of the Cabinet in Dublin.