HSE refuses to reveal cost of outsourcing smear tests to US

THE Health Service Executive has refused to reveal how much it is spending to outsource thousands of Irish women’s cervical smear tests to the US.

Before Christmas, the HSE launched an EU-wide procurement exercise to source additional laboratory capacity to tackle the major backlog in processing cervical smear tests. It then secured the services of a laboratory in America, saying it was entitled to do so on the basis of ‘urgent medical need’.

It expects to send 25,000 to 30,000 smears from across Ireland to the US laboratory, to clear backlog nationally.