I want to highlight to the Taoiseach the absolute failure of this country to look after the health needs of children. I will do this by giving an example of a case that proves the dysfunction in our system. Michael O'Sullivan of Dromroughty, Kenmare, County Kerry is a ten-year-old boy who is profoundly autistic and has a working diagnosis of alpha thalassemia X-linked intellectual disability, ATR-X, syndrome, which is rare. He has two loving parents in Jean and Teddy who care for him and go above and beyond the call of duty on a daily basis to care for their young son who is being failed by the health service in this country.

In 2019, at the age of eight, Michael suffered from a perforated bowel. Prior to this he had been waiting to see the gastro team in Crumlin hospital. It is no exaggeration to say that the perforation in his bowel when taken to University Hospital Kerry, UHK, that night almost killed young Michael. When suggested that he be airlifted to Dublin from UHK, a consultant said, "He won't make it in the air". That is how serious the matter was. Michael spent a total of 13 weeks in hospital following this. Following his stay in hospital, he continued to have serious issues with bowel movements, to the point where he now cannot have a bowel movement without the assistance of several doses of laxatives on a daily basis. For anyone who has experienced the discomfort of constipation and the pain it can cause, he or she can imagine facing this pain as a ten-year-old little boy on a daily basis.

Michael had to wait until January 2021 before meeting the gastro team in Dublin again. He met with them for half an hour and was prescribed medication that did not work. All subsequent appointments were done by phone rather than face to face. In October 2021, Michael spent a further two weeks in hospital where they were told they again would need to see the gastro team. Roll on to October 2022 and Michael was finally to see the team in Dublin. The appointment was cancelled and rescheduled for a few days later, but that dreaded call came from Dublin to say the appointment was cancelled. Michael, Jean and Teddy are still awaiting to get a call back with a rescheduled appointment.

The Taoiseach can stand up, blame Covid and talk about how much money the Government has spent on healthcare, how much capacity it has added and how winter has an impact on the system. Winter comes every year and the Government has done nothing to help Michael and, importantly, other children like him who, on a daily basis, are let down and left to suffer. I ask the Taoiseach to deal with this. The HSE is broken beyond repair.

Michael is suffering. He is crippled in pain every day. He cannot have bowel movements without laxatives and, worse again, he cannot get help. Why do we only have one gastro team for children in Ireland? Why do we not have one in Cork that could do appointments in UHK once a month? As Jean said, "Everyone is going the same direction up to Dublin - a never-ending bottleneck of people trying to access the one service, where you could be in Cashel and told your appointment is cancelled yet again".

I thank the Deputy for raising the issue. It is a very serious issue for young Michael and his parents, Jean and Teddy. The objective is, and should be, that this young child gets the very best of treatment for that young child that guarantees the best outcome and enables him to live a reasonable quality of life. From what the Deputy has said, that has not materialised from the health service. I do not have the individual background to the case, but I will follow it up. The Deputy has identified a very rare condition. In addition to being on what I think he said was the serious end of the autism spectrum, the fact that Michael has a rare condition with significant implications for gastro health seems to suggest he needs a referral and to be treated in the national centre in Crumlin and, eventually, in the new children's hospital. That requires a certain level of expertise that would only be provided in a national centre with a level of gastro expertise that would not be available in every centre in the country similar to cardiac, cancer or other major issues or, indeed, other rare diseases that affect different organs of the body. One needs that access.

The point the Deputy legitimately raised is that once those appointments happen and the requisite level of expertise is applied to the case, there should be a facility whereby whatever is prescribed or whatever programme is outlined for young Michael should be communicated, certainly to CUH, in order that there could be intermittent reviews and so on and a linkage with Crumlin in respect of how young Michael is treated and so forth.

The rarity of the condition is such that expert advice is needed. I will follow up the case on the Deputy's behalf to see if additional external expertise could be brought to bear on the case. The Deputy will appreciate I am not fully au fait with the case but I will follow up on it.

I thank the Taoiseach. I acknowledge the presence of the Minister for Health and I ask him, the Taoiseach and the Government please to take this young boy on board. I ask them to take him into their heads but, most importantly, before Christmas, I ask them to take him into their hearts.

We have gastro teams for adults but, as the Minister knows, we only have one gastro team dedicated to children. It is disappointing and heartbreaking for Jean, Teddy and young Michael to have an appointment and to get ready for the enormity of getting their bags packed and their car ready for the long journey to Dublin, only to have that pulled out from them at the last minute. Many Members present are parents. I ask them to take into their hearts and heads how it would be if that was their child, nephew, or niece, if they knew that the child had a pain in their belly every day and knowing the pain that creates in their heart. I ask them to please take this case on board. Let him get the attention he needs.

I would be the first person to compliment the Taoiseach. I raised a case here not too long ago when two children needed millions of euro to be spent and the Government, Minister for Health, Taoiseach and Tánaiste took it on board and did it. I was grateful for that and ask the Government to please do the same again. I thank the Taoiseach.

It is truly awful for parents to get that phone call when everything has been prepared to make the journey to Crumlin. Many of us as Deputies encounter families where there are significant health issues and I always recommend that a child would go to Crumlin because I would always be concerned that there may not be sufficient local expertise to deal with a rare condition. The issue is they should not have to face the kind of cancellations that occur. That is what the new national children's hospital is about. Unfortunately, it is taking time to complete that. That will create capacity. It will also separate outpatients from inpatients and so on. Equally, once a certain level of expertise and treatment has been applied, there should be linkages so that people are not travelling all the time. The nearest hospital could then deal with some issues that invariably arise from time to time with such conditions. However, we will follow it up.