Boy, 4, gets €2.4m for brain damage

A four-year-old boy who has been left severely brain damaged after a failure to diagnose and treat a bacterial infection in time has settled his High Court action with an interim payout of €2.4m.

Eoghan Dunne was just weeks short of his first birthday when he was brought to A&E Portiuncula Hospital, Ballinasloe, Co Galway, with a fever on August 3, 2012. He was breathless and lethargic.

His counsel, Bruce Antoniotti, told the High Court Eoghan should have been given antibiotics straight away, as the results of tests should have raised the alarm. He said his experts would say the tests indicated a bacterial infection.