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Updated at 4.40pm
THE DEPARTMENT OF Health says there are no plans to hold an inquiry into allegations that the bodies of hundreds of babies born to unmarried women in Ireland’s mother and baby homes were used in medical experiments after they died.
Last night, RTÉ’s Prime Time ran a special programme uncovering how hundreds of children at Irish institutions were used for medical research and dissected by medical students without their mothers’ consent right up until the 1960s.
The research also allegedly included vaccine trials in contravention of medical guidelines on captive populations. According to the programme, children’s residential institutions and mother and baby homes provided infants who could be monitored closely.
A spokesperson for the Department of Health told TheJournal.ie today that Reilly and Fitzgerald “deeply regret any distress caused as a result of any out-dated practices which are no longer in place or acceptable”.
The department is currently working on proposals for new legislation, the Human Tissue Bill, which will “provide for a strong consent framework for the donation of bodies to anatomy schools and will reflect current practices” in relation to the donation of bodies to anatomy schools.
Utter contempt
The Adoption Rights Alliance says that questions must be asked over the failure of previous inquiries and audits to reveal the extent to which the bodies of children intended for adoption were used in medical research.
It has called on the Minister for Health James Reilly and the Minister for Children Frances Fitzgerald to set up an inquiry into the claims.
The medical practices shown in the programme demonstrate an utter contempt for children born outside of marriage and for their mothers, it says. The organisation also urged Fitzgerald to introduce legislation which will provide adopted people with access to their medical records.
The Adoption Rights Alliance helpline can be reached on 086 2359127
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Israel are bullies simple as that.
Absolutely agree – your comment is very simple…
Steven,
that conflict will never be end simply because the Zionist want it to be continuo to allow them control the world and to abuse america and Europe for more hundred years, the Israeli and Zionist are guiding the USA to a trap hell every few years they create war after war simply because that kind of people can not live without conflicts and unrest
Empty words, prospect of peace with a multitude of preconditions. It seems to me that both sides enjoy being in a peace process, but neither wants it to come to fruition. It’s sort of like organized, controlled war. Mad.
As a Zionist, I can assure the previous writer that the “control of the world” figures nowhere in Zionism, our concern is the control, under G-d of the land given us by Him (Baruch HaShem). perhaps he should consider who does wish to control the world, the activity of Islamic Fundamentalists in every part of the world would respectfully suggest that it is the Islamic enemies of Zionism that wish to control the world. Perhaps the gentleman would get his facts clear before posting again.
Frank Faldo “Israel are bullies”, how do you justify that. It is not the Israelis who daily target innocent men women and children with rocket attacks, rather it is the enemies of Israel in Hamas and Islamic Jihad, who launch rocket attacks against Israeli people, military and civillian, men women and children alike. Israel only reacts to acts of terrorism and where possible, ensures that no non terrorist victims.
have your say