On 28 April the Health Protection Surveillance Centre (HPSC) alerted paediatricians, general practitioners, consultants in emergency medicine and directors of public health to details of a new emerging illness known as Paediatric inflammatory multisystem syndrome (PIMS).
PIMS is a rare condition and the potential link with Covid-19 is neither established nor well understood and the European Centre of Disease Control advises that the overall risk of PIMS in children in the EU is low.
Statistics in relation to this illness are a matter for the Health Service Executive and I have asked that they respond directly to the Deputy as soon as possible.