New entity replaces discredited Hep C body

A new Hep C support group has formed to replace the organisation whose funding was pulled because of concerns about “inappropriate and extravagant” use of public money.

Members of Positive Action Ltd voted to approve the winding-up of the group at an extraordinary general meeting at the weekend. The new entity will operate as the Hepatitis C Anti-D Support Group, the name originally used when the group first got together in 1994.

The setting up of a new group follows a HSE examination of Positive Action’s use of public money in which concerns were raised about the amount of funds spent on, inter alia, weekends away for members, and corporate expenses. The Irish Examiner revealed on Saturday how the group racked up a credit card bill of more than €20,000 between December 2012 and July 2013, with the bulk of the money spent on hotel accommodation and dining out. A further €13,000 was spent in February 2012 on a “pampering and relaxation” weekend at the Athlone Springs Hotel, against the expressed wishes of the HSE.

The Irish Examiner has also seen documentation in which the HSE queries how Positive Action had more than €27,000 in a deposit account in March 2013.

Positive Action had its funding pulled by the HSE last week and an internal audit is being finalised. A garda investigation is also under way following a complaint by a member of the group and a number of people have been interviewed.

The seven-member executive committee of Positive Action stepped down and the meeting resolved to form a working group, which includes Jane O’Brien, a founder of the original support group set up in 1994. No members of the outgoing executive are in the working group.

Members have also been invited to submit their own proposals. There is no funding currently available to the group.

Ms O’Brien said the outgoing members of the executive were “thanked sincerely” for their work on behalf of members. “It was overwhelmingly accepted that the outgoing group had done nothing wrong,” Ms O’Brien said. Ms O’Brien said there was a future for a new group and that the women “had affirmed their strength as a united group”.

The new group will not have access to Positive Action’s offices on Dublin’s Fitzwilliam Square. Ms O’Brien said they will operate out of their own homes as they did in the early days.

Positive Action has 730 members and was set up to support women given contaminated Anti-D human immunogloblin by the Blood Transfusion Service Board. More than 1,000 women were infected.