Sadly, one in four pregnancies ends in loss. The State supports women in terms of leave from work who miscarry from 26 weeks on or who tragically experience a stillbirth. However, if someone experiences early pregnancy loss, they do it in isolation and without access to State leave. I have campaigned for early pregnancy loss. One of the challenges I have come up against is the lack of available data. Now, however, thanks to the Department of children and youth affairs and Professor Keelin O'Donoghue, Professor Ruadh Kelly-Harrington, Dr. Marita Hennessy, Professor Mary Donnelly and the almost 1,000 women who shared their experience and feedback, we have the data. Some 77% of those women took time off work. More than one quarter had to resort to annual leave or unpaid leave and 95% said they would have availed of statutory leave, were it available. Where is the compassion for these women and their partners? Will this Government look at introducing statutory paid leave for early pregnancy loss?

We are all acutely aware of the trauma of pregnancy loss. It is something that probably was not talked about enough in Irish society. Maybe that is why it has not gotten the degree of focus it needed. We wanted to change that. We felt that we needed to take a first step in undertaking that. As the Deputy said, we brought forward a detailed piece of research, which I think Deputies will find useful. If they get time, they should look at it. This will form the basis of decisions by the Government in terms of the next steps. I cannot give any absolute commitments today, but we have some very useful data and that can inform the next steps.