Rethink urged over children’s hospital location
She had hoped to meet Taoiseach Enda Kenny when he was presented with a petition signed by 60,000 people opposed to the site being located at St James’s.
However, the small group of representatives of the Connolly for Kids Hospital campaign was told at the last minute that Mr Kenny was unavailable.
A copy of the petition was given to a Leinster House usher. It urges Mr Kenny to build the hospital on a greenfield site at Connolly Hospital in Blanchardstown.
The campaign group is seeking a public hearing on the issue at the Oireachtas health committee.
An Bord Pleanála in April granted planning permission for the St James’s site; the deadline for filing a High Court judicial review has passed.
The Children’s Hospital Group said yesterday that the St James’s site was the right choice and construction work for the first phase of the project would start “within a matter of weeks”.
It argued that the critical level of clinical support that was available at St James’s was not available at Connolly Hospital.
Ms Flynn, from Cobh, Co Cork, whose three-year-old daughter Kate has serious respiratory complications and needs a ventilator to breathe when she goes to sleep, is not convinced.
“I am fully supporting the Connolly for Kids Hospital because Kate and I had to live in Our Lady’s Children’s Hospital for 15 months so I know how hard it is being away from my family,” she said.
“Hospital accessibility is crucial for Kate — really a matter of life and death. Kate has had four emergency ambulance transfers where I have been actively resuscitating her in the back of the vehicle.
“For Kate, every second counts so I would have concerns if she was being transferred to a hospital situated beside St James’s Hospital, especially if we hit rush-hour traffic.
“I also feel that the site at Connolly Hospital is more accessible to people like me living down south or in the west of the country.”
Ms Flynn said she had no idea of what life was like having a child with a life- limiting condition until she had Kate, who has a complex tracheotomy and needs full-time medical care.
“I had two normal health pregnancies before Kate and then my life changed in an instant,” she said.
