A LEADING cystic fibrosis campaigner whose personal circumstances led to a public outcry over continuing delays to vital treatment facilities, has lost her fight for life.

Hospital authorities today signed the contract for the construction of the long-awaited cystic fibrosis unit at St Vincent’s Hospital in Dublin.

The Cystic Fibrosis Association is calling for a complete overhaul of the organ donation system here.

WITH 30 cystic fibrosis sufferers on a waiting list for double lung transplant, the Cystic Fibrosis Association of Ireland (CFAI) had called for a state-sponsored programme to raise organ donation awareness.

CONSTRUCTION chiefs are confident many builders will be interested in the state’s “build now, get paid later” offer to develop the 120-bed unit at St Vincent’s University Hospital in Dublin, which will include dedicated facilities for cystic fibrosis patients.

PROGRESS being made to improve treatment facilities for about 1,200 people in Ireland with cystic fibrosis (CF) was described as “frightfully slow” by a leading campaign group.

BUILDING will start this year on an isolation unit at the main treatment centre for adult cystic fibrosis sufferers in Dublin, the Health Service Executive announced yesterday.

THIRTY people with cystic fibrosis (CF) died last year, the highest death toll from the disease in 14 years.

THESE are the shocking conditions that one cystic Fibrosis sufferer was forced to endure during a stay in hospital this week.

MARY HAND is waiting for a call that will turn her life around. The 23-year-old from Dingle, Co Kerry, has cystic fibrosis and needs a double lung transplant as soon as possible.

NEWBORN babies are not being screened for Ireland’s most common life-threatening inherited disease, unlike in the North and the rest of the EU.

PEOPLE with cystic fibrosis (CF) in Ireland receive less care and die younger than in almost any other country in the developed world.

CYSTIC fibrosis sufferers could die if the State fails to protect them from potentially fatal hospital bugs, a campaign group warned yesterday.

CYSTIC FIBROSIS sufferers could catch potentially fatal hospital bugs because there are no isolation facilities for them, an independent review of services has warned.

AT least three Irish patients have been refused surgery at the British hospital which is refusing to offer Billy Burke a lung transplant operation, it has emerged.

IRELAND is ready to perform the first lung transplant operation here this summer.

LUNG transplant patients will no longer have to travel to Britain for life-saving surgery as the first such operation will take place here within weeks.