Letters to the Editor: Fitting that new hospital be named after the outstanding Dr Lynn

Kathleen Lynn and Madeleine ffrench-Mullen with infants at St Ultan's Hospital in Dublin, c 1920. Picture: Royal College of Physicians of Ireland

The 28th of this month marks the 150th anniversary of the birth of one of the outstanding figures of modern Irish history. 

Kathleen Lynn co-founded the first children’s hospital in Ireland at a time when Dublin suffered one of the highest infant mortality rates in all of Europe. That was St Ultan’s on Charlemont St, Dublin, then a deprived district at the edge of the city centre.

Dr Lynn had previously been a captain in James Connolly’s Irish Citizen Army, taking command of the Dublin City Hall garrison in 1916. Her St Ultan’s co-founder and lifelong partner, Madeleine ffrench-Mullen, was also a Citizen Army veteran.

Following her graduation in 1899, she was refused employment by several hospitals due to her gender. After eventually securing work, Dr Lynn was then sacked due to her role in the Easter Rising. Thereafter, her livelihood depended on private practice from her home in Rathmines and in St Ultan’s.

Throughout her life, Dr Lynn was central to many innovations in medical and social care and Minister Noel Browne centred his national anti-TB drive at St Ultan’s. Long before modern holistic approaches to health were established, Dr Lynn lauded the benefits of clean air and outdoor activities and gifted her private cottage in Glenmalure to An Óige, still a thriving hostel.

Some years ago a campaign supported by prominent professionals, academics, and the public at large, to name the proposed new children’s hospital in her honour was launched. In 2017, an unprecedented 58 Dublin City councillors signed their names to a petition to the then minister of health Simon Harris, requesting that the new hospital be named the Dr Kathleen Lynn National Children’s Hospital. The councillors received nothing more than an acknowledgment of receipt of letter.

After the embarrassment of the original naming attempt, it is surely past time for the three Government parties to clarify their position on the clear public and professional demand that the new hospital at Rialto, Dublin, be named The Dr Kathleen Lynn National Children’s Hospital.

Billy Fitzpatrick, Terenure, Dublin

Fair Deal needed for Home Care

As we face a growing elderly population and big changes in the structure of how generations link up with each other we need a new model as to how we address the issue. Why is it taking us so long to have a statutory Fair Deal Scheme for Home Care similar to the Fair Deal Scheme that applies to Nursing Home Care? With most of our elderly living in good quality homes, a proper payment for home carers and a wish by everyone that they could live out their out their lives in their own home and at a less cost why are we so much afraid to look at a new model of home care based on the above merits.

Conal Shovlin, Ardara, Co Donegal

Column on Heavy Gang was disturbing, revealing

Michael Clifford’s column regarding the late Gerry O’Carroll in Monday’s Irish Examiner should be put up there as one of the best articles ever written for a daily newspaper in recent times. From start to finish it was riveting, factual, and apart from those who were familiar with O’Carroll’s notorious career, revealing and disturbingly fascinating.

Those of us who remember and followed the reporting of the law and order Heavy Gang in the ’70s certainly will not be surprised.

Nicholas Parker, Lackaroe, Youghal

Basketball Ireland stance and figures are wrong

Basketball Ireland released a statement on January 3, only after severe public pressure, saying that they will proceed to play against the official team from the Israeli regime. Their justification was that “forfeiting the game would lead to a very significant fine from FIBA Europe”. That is very interesting to me. Because what mental arithmetic are they doing, if they think that paying a fine is worse than never receiving a single more cent in government funding? Because if they persist in aiding and abetting the Israeli regime in perpetrating genocide and apartheid, then the vast majority of Irish people who are, naturally, against such vile crimes, will be sure to make Basketball Ireland pay that price. Now it is up to Basketball Ireland and its CEO, John Sheehan, to re-do its sums. How much blood money is needed for them to abandon support for the barbaric crimes of Israel?

Patrick Connolly, Clonmel, Co Tipperary

Freeing hostages should be condition of ceasefire

Sunday, January 14, will mark the 100th day of captivity for the 136 Israelis kidnapped on October 7, 2023, who are still held hostage by Hamas and its civilian supporters in Gaza.

It is time to bring them home.

Those captives already released have suffered enormous trauma. Medical evidence shows that many were drugged to keep them quiet and that they were physically, mentally, and sexually abused by their captors. One woman was kept in the dark, underground, for days. The children will need years of treatment to recover. The remaining hostages are no doubt enduring similar appalling treatment.

Meanwhile, eyewitness accounts, medical reports, and video evidence of the atrocities committed by Hamas on and after October 7 are denied or minimised as propaganda, in the same way the world ignored news of the Holocaust as it was taking place. Some Irish politicians — particularly members of People before Profit — even celebrated the attacks, including murder of children and gang rapes, as ‘glorious intifada’.

Calls for a ceasefire MUST be conditional on the release of ALL the hostages, including the two mentally ill men, Avera Mangistu and Hisham al-Sayed, who have been captive in Gaza for years.

I implore you, as an elected representative of the Irish people, to use every avenue you possess to press for the release of ALL hostages.

Alan Ryan, Clondalkin, Dublin

US Airforce in Shannon a payment for services

Since Easter 1916, when rebel de Valera was not hanged because he was American-born, the Irish have depended on US pressure on Britain as regards the North. Reminding Daniel Teegan that there are no free lunches, USAF aircraft staging through Shannon are part of the bill for services rendered.

Frank Adam, Hartley Avenue, Prestwich

Government migrant climb down cowardly

The Government’s caving into the protests against the accommodation of single migrant men in Ballinrobe is both cowardly and hypocritical. With this climb down, the Irish Government has given each town and village in the country a veto over who can live in their community. The Government’s failure to address the stigmatising of single migrant men adds insult to injury and has fanned the flames of racism and discrimination.

There are at least 10,000 undocumented/unvetted Irish migrants in the US; the Americans aren’t concerned about them, so why should we be concerned about migrants coming here? There is huge hypocrisy in our approach to migration.

Tim Buckley, White St, Cork City

‘Dancing with the Stars’ offers inspiration

I get wonderful exercise, courtesy Dancing with the Stars. During the time it’s on screen, I get out for a brisk walk!

Tom Gilsenan, Dublin 9

Backing Ukraine as Gaza dies is hypocritical

The last three months have left me utterly cynical. All through the support for Ukraine after Russia’s invasion, I cheered on the support.

A guilty feeling inside of me was critical. How could I be critical of supporting a country defending itself from invasion and occupation? Because I knew that Palestine has had the exact same experience, with no assistance from Western countries.

I said to myself Ukraine needs the help now, that’s what’s most important. I couldn’t even imagine then the situation that we have today.

Israel carpet bombs Gaza, and Volodymyr Zelenskyy approves. Zelenskyy, who the world supported as the man fighting for the world’s freedom.

Over 20,000 civilians murdered by Israel, who will still be appearing in Eurovision.

Ethnic cleansing — a whole city brought to rubble. And Basketball Ireland will still play against Israel in the coming weeks.

I remember writing a letter before October of 2023 encouraging the FAI to not have double standards — boycotting Russia and not Israel. This was before October 7, and all the brutality since. Other letter-writers slammed back, claiming sport brings people together, brings Arabs and Jews together.

Little children who were playing soccer in Gaza were killed by missiles. A child witnessed his friend explode, while kicking the ball. And the bombs keep dropping, brought through our airports from the United States. The United States rallied us all against Russia as an “Axis of Evil”.

We see real evil, and like Hannah Arendt said, it is banal. It is everyday. It is normalised. It is the “international community” whom I wish to have nothing more to do with.

The hypocrisy makes me sick to my stomach. What kind of world...

Fachtna O’Raftery, Clonakilty, Co Cork

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