Calls for Harney to quit over failure to set up inquiry

SURVIVORS of a procedure where the pelvis of women in labour was split in two have demanded the resignation of Health Minister Mary Harney over her failure to establish an inquiry.

The Survivors of Symphysiotomy (SOS) group yesterday demanded a full independent public inquiry into the 1,500 suspected cases of the procedures in hospitals over five decades.

The calls came after the screening of a Prime Time Investigates documentary, screened on Thursday night, in which women affected by symphysiotomy spoke of the its devastating effect.

The practice was carried out up to the early ’80s at Our Lady Of Lourdes Hospital, Drogheda, despite being ended in the 1960s elsewhere. Experts have claimed symphysiotomy had been widely discredited in the developed world by the 1940s, when it was reintroduced in some hospitals here.

Yesterday, a solicitor representing 111 symphysiotomy survivors said Health Minister Mary Harney had refused to open the way for an inquiry, despite this week’s RTÉ programme, and therefore should resign.

Colm MacGeehin said: “I do not call for that lightly, but she has been given opportunity after opportunity of addressing this, one of the worst medical scandals in Irish medical history.”

The women who underwent the procedure – often without explanation and when a caesarian birth was an option – have said they suffered serious physical and emotional problems as a result, ranging from incontinence to depression.

When Micheál Martin was health minister he promised a review of symphysiotomy cases, but survivors have claimed their calls for a full inquiry have been ignored.

“Every single woman was crippled for life both physically and emotionally,” Mr MacGeehin said, adding that another “myth” exploded by the programme was that women had been provided with adequate support following the symphysiotomy.

Another speaker, former MEP Patricia McKenna said symphysiotomy was “deliberate mutilation of women in this country” and said Ms Harney’s position was now untenable.

One survivor, Kathleen Naughton, became emotional when she said: “If Minister Harney was in my body for one day we would have a review the next day.”

In addition to a full apology from government and the setting up of an independent inquiry, the SOS group also wants the HSE to establish proper support services.

A test case on behalf of a victim faltered at the High Court stage in the last decade, but clerical child sex abuse campaigner Paddy Doyle said the precedent had been set in that issue for the Statute of Limitations to be removed or altered to allow cases come before the courts.