Women 'arrive from airport in labour'

AMBULANCES regularly bring heavily pregnant non-nationals from the airport runway to one of country's main maternity hospitals.

The Master of the Rotunda Hospital, Dr Michael Geary, confirmed the hospital receives women in labour who have just come off a flight into Dublin Airport, contradicting Labour Party views on so-called citizenship tourists.

The assertion by Labour justice spokesman Joe Costello that there was nothing to suggest non-nationals presenting to hospitals in an advanced stage of pregnancy were coming from abroad was dismissed by Dr Geary. "Ambulances have come directly from the airport in recent years. We have certainly had a couple of cases in the last number of months," he said.