‘No records exist’ on timing of cancer reports

NOT a single record exists to explain why the Department of Health and the Health Service Executive (HSE) decided to publish three reports on the cancer-screening crisis on the same day.

After a long delay, the department published two of the reports, and the HSE the third, on March 5 last. This coincided with the verdict in the Brian Kearney murder trial, in which he was found guilty of murdering his wife Siobhan.

The trial attracted much news coverage on the day and some Opposition members were privately suspicious about the timing of the reports’ publication. However, not a single paper record exists to explain why the department and the HSE chose to publish the reports on the day in question. The Irish Examiner applied under the Freedom of Information Act for any documentation concerning the decision to release the reports on March 5.

In a written response, the official handling the request at the Department of Health said: “The department has not found any such records. I find that, so far as I am able to determine, the records sought by you do not exist.”

Similarly, the official handling the request at the HSE’s National Hospitals Office responded: “[The NHO] has not found the records, or discovered any indication that they ever existed... the NHO has not become aware of any reason or policy under which such records would have been created.”

The same letter told the Irish Examiner there would have been “conversations on the issue” between the Department of Health, the HSE and the NHO, but “no letters or emails exchanged”. The reports addressed the misdiagnosis of women with breast cancer at Portlaoise General Hospital and found serious medical and managerial problems contributed to the crisis, but they avoided holding anyone responsible.