asked the Minister for Health whether in view of the public disquiet which recent newspaper reports have aroused he has caused inquiries to be made into allegations that a person now alive was falsely declared by a certain Dublin Hospital to have died in that Hospital on 11th November 1931, and that the authorities in question handed over to the parents a body, wrongfully stated by them to be hers which the parents buried accordingly; and whether as a result of his inquiries he is in a position to make a statement to the House before the Easter recess.
Ceisteanna-Questions Oral Answers. - Newspaper Reports of Death Declaration by Dublin Hospital.
2.
The Deputy is, of course, aware that these reports refer to events alleged to have taken place thirty years ago. However, in view of the disquiet to which the Deputy has referred, I caused searching inquiries to be made. As a result of these, I am satisfied that the person now alive to whom the reports relate, while it is understood that she was a patient in this particular hospital in 1924, was not a patient there at any time in 1931 and, consequently, could not have been handed over as alleged by the hospital authority to an orphanage. Any story or statement based on assumptions contrary to this established fact are unlikely to be true.