The fact that nine staff members who treated Savita Halappanavar before her death at Galway University Hospital have been disciplined shows that the case “was misused, massively and continuously, by major players in politics and media who were more concerned with getting abortion legislation over the line than accurate reporting”, the Pro-Life Campaign has said.
Cora Sherlock of the Pro-Life Campaign said the news “confirms that this tragic case was never about the non-availability of abortion in Ireland at the time but the mismanagement surrounding Savita’s care.”
The Health Service Executive confirmed today that nine members of staff had been disciplined because of failures in their treatment of Mrs Halappanavar.
The 31-year-old died at the hospital in 2012 as a result of septic poisoning after suffering a miscarriage. Her death triggered a debate on Ireland’s abortion laws, but a number of reports since have identified numerous shortcomings in her medical care that resulted in her death.
A year later, the West/NorthWest Hospital Group pledged to review the actions of all staff members involved in the care of Halappanavar.
This was “in the interest of restoring public confidence in the maternity services at University Hospital Galway”.
Out of 30 staff members whose actions were considered, 21 had “no case to answer”, according to a statement from the hospital group.
But the Irish Times reports that of the nine remaining staff, some were issued with written warnings. Under the HSE’s disciplinary rules, “If the employee fails to make the necessary improvements or if the nature of the unsatisfactory performance/conduct is more serious, she/he will normally be issued with a formal written warning for a period of nine months”.
The written warning gives details of the complaint, the improvements required and the timescale for improvement. The warning is removed after nine months, subject to satisfactory improvement.
A small number of other staff were required to undertake “pre-procedural” informal counselling with training and mentoring. According to the HSE’s disciplinary manual, informal counselling takes place without invoking the disciplinary procedure and involves telling the staff member what aspect of work needs improvement and identifying what supports can be provided to achieve this objective.
Commenting on the reports of disciplinary action, Cora Sherlock, Deputy Chairperson of the Pro Life Campaign said:
“The tragic death of Savita Halappanavar was misused, massively and continuously, by major players in politics and media who were more concerned with getting abortion legislation over the line than accurate reporting. Today’s report that nine members of staff who treated Ms Halappanavar before her death have been disciplined further confirms that this tragic case was never about the non-availability of abortion in Ireland at the time but the mismanagement surrounding Savita’s care.”
Ms Sherlock said “Those who pushed the distorted version of the story hardest from the start have never bothered to set the record straight in light of all the reports that have contradicted their initial presentation of the case. These journalists and politicians were happy to hard wire a false account of what happened into people’s minds and to this day they have no intention of disturbing their original narrative.
“The public discussion on abortion in Ireland at present is deeply dishonest and the reality of this has been shown most clearly in the way Savita’s tragic case was exploited and used to railroad through last year’s abortion legislation.”
