I saw a drawing recently of a woman walking across the gap between a train and the platform while somebody in a wheelchair is unable to cross it. I think this image is representative of many of the gaps that are easy for most people to navigate but very difficult for those with disabilities, both intellectual and physical.
My son, Jack, who has severe/profound intellectual disability and a physical disability, is 18. He is now faced with transition to a new respite service, from school to adult services, childrenâs disability network team to adult disability team (not really existent) â and hospital transition is the biggest one, because Jack is under the care of 14 medical teams.
Nobody replaces a paediatrician and there is no such thing as a disability doctor, so you have to wait until the age of 65 to get a geriatrician â and thatâs if you make it. Kids like Jack with life-limiting illnesses donât usually live long lives. A general paediatrician is instrumental in the healthcare of people with complex medical illness. They act like an umbrella doctor and coordinate all the care and arrange multidisciplinary team meetings between all the teams when necessary. For us, thatâs usually every two years, sometimes annually, but so hard to organise, it can take months to do so. They are invaluable in the healthcare of a child with complex care needs.
That doesnât change as the child becomes an adult. The truth is that things get harder and more complex. In many cases, their health may deteriorate as some have progressive diseases.
The caring is also more difficult as the child is bigger, now an adult, and the parents are also older. The health of carers (mostly parents) declines quicker than the health of the general population because they donât get to care for themselves, and may not have the time or the means to attend doctorsâ or hospital appointments. Also, they are dealing with huge levels of anxiety and are often living on the poverty line.
Who will be the coordinator now for my young adult? Me? Iâm already doing the job of so many others. 18 is not a magic number. The care needs are still the same.
Support is needed and a supportive pathway for transition across the board needs to be established for all those with disabilities. Right now, there is none.
Aisling McNiffe, Straffan, Co Kildare
We canât ignore genocide in Gaza
Over 1m Palestinians in Gaza are facing imminent famine. The images of babies, children, people of all ages starving to death are burned into our brains.
Starvation in Gaza kills just as surely as bombs, white phosphorus, and toxic gas, and the vast majority of victims are civilians, including infants and children.
Before the war, more than 10,000 trucks per month brought food into Gaza. Since the war started, just over 2,000 per month have been able to make the trek. As a result, flour, rice, and other necessities are in severely short supply, and thousands of people wait for a small ration of lentil soup.
Children go to bed hungry even though trucks filled with food are forced by Israel to wait just outside the restricted zones. Netanyahuâs government is preventing them from entering, one more strategy of war that does little to hurt Hamas while indiscriminately murdering innocent civilians. Israelâs defence minister Yoav Gallant dehumanises the Palestinians calling them âhuman animalsâ. He vowed, âno food, no water, no electricity, no fuelâ.
Israel is targeting of Rafah, where 1.5m Palestinians are sheltering, because the Israeli government intends to drive Palestinians into permanent exile. We cannot stand idly by as these defenceless people face this brutality everywhere in Palestine, from Israelâs genocidal massacres in Gaza to military attacks in the West Bank where water deprivation is being used by the Israelis as a weapon against Palestinians. The Israeli regime is bent on annihilating Palestinian life to remove the people from their native land.
Israel is operating with full impunity and full unconditional US backing, with zero consequences from weak western elected leaders for each new war crime.
We cannot stand idly by, numb, as we watch this death toll climb. Nor can our EU leaders be complicit in this bloodshed. The US government cannot continue to be an accomplice in genocide by supporting the Israeli government violate international law and continue to operate with disregard for human life. US president Joe Biden must immediately release the $370m (âŹ343m) pledged to Unrwa and stand up to the American-Israeli billionaires that choose US candidates for election.
Biden must be told that genocide is not a foreign policy doctrine and Israel cannot be permitted to bomb their way to the last Palestinian standing.
Daniel Teegan, Union Hall, Co Cork
Time for action on drugs crisis
âIreland has third highest level of deaths on rural roads in EUâ (Irish Examiner, March 28/29)Â gave detailed EU data on road usage in this country. It seems every bank holiday weekend, approaching Christmas or Easter, we are reminded in the newspapers, radio, and on television in advertisements that An Garda SĂochĂĄna will be launching a campaign on our roads to reduce deaths.
While this is commendable, where is the outrage, condemnation, and preventative action to reduce the level of drug-related deaths in our communities? We know we have the second- or third-highest level of consumption of cocaine in the EU and we are on course to have over three times the level of road deaths, if current trends continue when figures for drug-related deaths for this year are published.
The families left behind and communities suffering merit our collective effort to do better as a society.
Why are we so accepting of quite shocking figures â about two drug-related deaths every day of the year â that are released year after year to relative silence? The numbers have been steadily increasing for over a decade now with the Health Research Board releasing quite depressing data on an annual basis.
Every preventable death is tragic and, for many, traumatic. At what point will we say enough is enough and take serious action to reduce drug-related deaths in this country?
Stephen OâHara, Carrowmore, Sligo
We have questions to answer about Israelâs actions too
The Irish Governmentâs decision to intervene in South Africaâs genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) is to be welcomed (Irish Examiner, March 26).
However, the Irish Government itself is not without blame in such very serious matters. South Africa initiated its genocide case against Israel in December 2023, and the ICJ issued its preliminary verdict on January 26, 2024, stating that: âIt is plausible that Israel is committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza. The State of Israel must take all measures within its power to prevent the commission of genocide.â
Following on from these proceedings and findings, the Genocide Convention 1948 obliges all states including Ireland to âtake all measures within its power to prevent the commission of genocideâ.
The US government and the US military have been actively supporting Israel in its military actions in Gaza since October 7, and this has continued since January 26. Up to 100 aircraft associated with the US military have transited through Shannon Airport or Irish airspace since October 7 2023, and have continued to do so since January 26.
On March 27, as I write this letter, a US Navy C-40A aircraft is at Shannon airport having arrived early this morning from the Oceana US naval air station. The Irish Government has questions to answer before the ICJ with regard to its failures to comply with the genocide convention and its failures to prevent complicity in genocide.
Edward Horgan, Castletroy, Limerick
Questions about the Re-turn system
On the Newstalk Breakfast programme recently, members of the public were allowed to ask CEO Ciaran Foley questions about the Re-turn/deposit system.
I donât think the questions went far enough to get any indepth answers from Mr Foley so I have a few for you to ponder.
Why didnât we have a bag we could use for these separated bottles and cans, uncrushed, in our recycling bin, where they could easily be retrieved? And not have this messy system where we are likely to have thousands if not millions of euro in unpaid deposits.
Mr Foley mentioned that, at the moment, we have a collection rate from our recycling bins of 80%. To me this is a great achievement for the Irish people and we should be proud of it. Mr Foley suggested with the Re-turn system we can reach 98% collection.
It seems to me that a lot of our money will be spent on these machines and no account of the effort we will have in getting our deposits back is worth this extra 18%.
Mr Foley mentioned that the bottles would be reused seven times. I seem to remember hearing somewhere that the particles in plastic bottles break down, if used more than once. This referred to PET and PETE plastic drinking bottles. It was not recommended to use them more than once. Is this still correct?
Originally, we had one bin for everything. Then we had two. Now we have four bins at the gate. Environmentally, we feel we are helping each time. We are doing our bit in helping the planet. Why have they made it so awkward for us to collect? If I had a choice I would prefer another bin at my gate, rather than this messy, complicated return/deposit system that wastes our time, our money, and our patience by being forced upon us.
Tony OâLoughlin, Coonagh, Limerick
