I want to talk to the Tánaiste about one of my constituents, Eimear Byrne. Eimear is a 30-year-old from Arklow, a primary school teach in a Gaelscoil and a very talented and popular young woman but she needs our help. She has an extremely rare genetic disorder which led to open-heart surgery at the age of just ten.

Three years ago, Eimear had again to undergo emergency heart surgery. The surgery saved her life but there were complications and she suffered a severe stroke. Recently, she was told there were three more aneurysms that required immediate surgery, which is highly complex. She has been advised by multiple hospital consultants that this operation cannot be carried out in Ireland and can take place only in Baltimore, USA.

Eimear has worked with the HSE. I have been in touch directly with our Minister on a treatment abroad scheme application. The wonderful community of Arklow and beyond are fundraising. Eimear is running out of time and we must do everything possible to ensure she gets this life-saving critical surgery.

I thank Deputy Brennan for raising this issue with the usual passion, empathy and decency he brings to all matters on the floor of the Dáil. Our colleague the Minister, Deputy Carroll MacNeill, who is present, is working with the Deputy on this. I will certainly work with him on it, too.

We are all thinking of Eimear. We send our very best wishes to her and her family. None of us can even begin to imagine how difficult the last number of years have been.

A factual point to make is that the HSE operates the EU treatment abroad scheme for people entitled under what is called EU Regulation 883/2004. I am putting that on the record to be helpful. The scheme is consultant led and allows for a public consultant based in Ireland to refer a public patient who is normally resident in Ireland for treatment in the healthcare service of another EU member state, the UK or Switzerland. There is no statutory framework for the referral of patients outside of that. I do not say that to be difficult; I just say it to be honest. However, the HSE has informed officials in the Department that it has received an application in relation to Eimear's situation this April. The HSE is now trying to evaluate that. It has sought some further information, and when it has received that documentation, it will work its way through it and engage further with the family. The Minister for Health will continue to seek urgent updates on the status of that application, and of course she will engage directly with the Deputy.