Hepatitis C victim remains critical

AN Irish hepatitis C sufferer remains in a critical condition in a London hospital and there are still no immediate plans to give her a potentially life-saving liver transplant.

A spokesman for King’s College Hospital said that Sylvia O’Leary, 32, remained in a serious condition and that her husband, Des, maintains a constant vigil by her bedside.

Mrs O’Leary, a mother of two from Ballincollig, Co Cork, won her battle over Christmas with the Department of Health for a compensation pay-out, but the deal was so late that she remains unaware that her family will be looked after in the event of her death.

She was flown by air ambulance to London last Saturday after doctors at Cork University Hospital decided she was fit to travel. Specialists at King’s College Hospital are battling to improve Mrs O’Leary's condition so she will be strong enough to undergo the operation.

She contracted hepatitis C after being given a contaminated blood product during her first liver transplant in 1991.

If she undergoes another transplant at King’s College Hospital it will be her third.

“Everybody is praying for Sylvia,” family solicitor Melissa Gowan said, adding that it was the second Christmas she had been in hospital awaiting a transplant.

“She went into hospital in Christmas 2001 and got the transplant the following March. During all that time her husband stayed at her bedside and he’s doing it again,” Ms Gowan said.

She said that the couple’s two children Emma, 13, and Dillon, six, remained in Cork where they are being looked after by relatives. Before Christmas Mrs O’Leary was at the centre of a row between her family and Minister for Health Micheál Martin over payment of compensation.

Her family had claimed the Department of Health was gambling on her life by delaying payment, hoping it would have to pay less if she died before the deal was signed off.

After they went public the minister refuted the accusation. Within a few days the Department of Health agreed to pay Mrs O’Leary compensation believed to be in the region of 1 million.

Her compensation had to be dealt with outside of the scope of the hepatitis C compensation tribunal, because she was informed about her illness only after the closing date for claims to the inquiry.