This guy is a serious heavy weight in the ob/gyn world and I’d be very confident of both his independence and integrity. I think he is Sri Lankan, but his professional career has been all in the UK.

I can also see how it makes sense to have people from the hospital on the team, and they are in a minority, both for the knowledge they will bring of what is the normal procedures locally and the report they make, whatever its findings, will very likely affect future treatment protocols at the hospital and thus having senior staff on board makes sense.

One concern I do have is that there is no statement that the report will be made public – I sincerely hope it will be.

I welcome the investigation and I wish it success. It is important to appreciate the limits of the inquiry. It will be along the lines of a morbidity and mortality review. It will not address the larger and very important issue as to the need for timely Constitutional reform, a need which exists independently of Savita’s sad death. It is possible that the Investigators may be permitted to inquire into perceived legal impediments to necessary or prudent medical intervention by the clinicians involved but it will not be their role to opine on this aspect. The clinicians involved will need to be very careful that they are not scapegoated but the identities of the investigators indicates that this fact finding, not adjudicative, body will be fair and objective.

The legal dimension can only be addressed by the abolition of Article 40.3.3 of the Constitution introduced by the Eight Amendment in 1983, not 1982, as I previously incorrectly said.

I heard a political handler say that the worst is now over, multiple investigations will take the heat out of this and the public will become increasingly bored as the specific details emerge. The politicians are congratulating themselves and the Taoiseach in keeping a cool head and not becoming addled by public hysteria and strong feelings.

Back to business as usual. Ireland is the safest place in the world to have a baby, Archbishop Martin has pronounced his sympathy but his little distress over some of the reaction. So, please let those disruptive elements at the back of the class or church settle down. What’s one adult life when there are foetuses out there to be saved?

Procedures, processes and prolonged analysis now takes place. We will get paralysis by analysis. Prevaricate, procrastinate and prolong. Would a 12 year Public Tribunal of Inquiry Assist?

Incidentally, should we attract some medical tourism to Ireland? Have your baby in Ireland! Free Roman Catholic baptism included!

So have we got this out of our system, had our march, a few whines and we can now patiently wait for the next death. Think about it. If you we’re a clinician would you now risk performing a therapeutic abortion unless you were totally certain the the mother would otherwise die and even then would you be legally safe? Time to put surgical gowns on Senior Counsel and put them in the operating theatre.

We Irish don’t like to do prolonged indignation or outrage. A quick moan will do. Sigh!

Whatever the outcome, I hope it doesn’t impede finally legislating for the X case.

By fudging the difference between this tragic case and the lack of legislation, interested parties will find themselves high & dry if it turns out the staff were just plain negligent.

How can it be independent when there are staff from the hospital that she died in on the panel of enquiry?

3 of the team are colleagues of those being investigated…

So, just to sum up:

1. 3 of the 7 people on the inquiry are GUH colleagues.
2. There’s no timeframe.
3. There’s not terms of reference yet.

So far, not very comforting.

P.

This is making me very uneasy. Already the whitewash has started, and there are people claiming a) that India has no right to comment and b) the results of the investigation will exonerate everybody (and we’ll all have to apologise for offending the sensibilities of Irish medics)

If this had happened to an Irish woman, would it (quite correctly) be receiving this amount of attention or would they have been able to quietly bury it away?

How come there are so many people who are already so sure the investigation will exonerate everybody? And how come these people seem to be pretty much 100% conservative, right wing catholics?

What gets me is that all this happened a month ago. Why did it take so long to come to public attention ? And if it hadn’t, would there be any investigation ? I echo the comments as well about colleagues of those involved being on the investigation panel. That means it can’t be truly impartial.

The doctors from UCHG are experts in their fields, they understand not only their own specialities but the internal practices in the hospital. The attempt by certain posters here to suggest that they will act in anything but a professional and thorough manner is unfortunate and deeply insulting to these individuals and is not based at all in any fact.

It was interesting to read the comments of Dr Hema Divakar, President of Federation of Obstetric and Gynaecological Societies of India who has said “Delay or refusal to terminate the pregnancy does not in itself seem to be the cause of death. Even if the law permitted it, it is not as if her life would have been saved because of termination… Severe septicaemia with disseminated intravascular coagulation (DIC), a life-threatening bleeding disorder which is a complication of sepsis, major organ damage and loss of the mother’s blood due to severe infection, is the cause of death in Savita’s case. This is what seems to have happened and this is a sequence which cannot be reversed just by terminating the pregnancy”

I’m not saying that Dr Divakar is right or wrong it just nice to have a clear and calm opinion offered rather than some of the more hysterical offerings that have been posted on this website over the last few days.

James, causation involves an analysis of immediate cause and ultimate cause, causa casuals.

It may be the case that in Savita’s case the immediate or proximate cause was septicaemia and associated DIC. Then you examine the history and sequence. What is the aetiology of the septicaemia, which is a symptom or result of something else? What caused the septicaemia. Septicaemia, according to the known history so far, did not exist on presentation by Savita in hospital. It seems that the septicaemia developed later and very long after the first opportunity for inducement of the foetus had occurred. Had inducement, say by administration of oxytocin taken place, the window for infection would have been closed before septicaemia was diagnosed. It may well have prevented infection through the open cervix.m

But if we accept that article 40.3.3 of the Constitution is the law of Ireland in addition to the 1861 act, then we have to accept that the life of the woman and the preservation of the foetus are equal, then any medical intervention which hastens the expiry of the foetus, even if the foetus will expire in any event, risks the commission of a serious criminal offence.

I should make my position clear. I personally favour the interests, life and health, of the mother over and above the interests of the foetus in all circumstances. A mother is a human being. A foetus is of enormous vale, it has the potential to be human, but it is not an entity which is comparable in any way to the life of the mother.

In short, therapeutic abortion is a major legal risk in Ireland even if it fits within the interpretation of the four Supreme Court judges, the real and substantial risk to the mother but not the prevention of an uncertain infection.

By all means the treatment of Savita should be closely and forensically scrutinised but we need to refrain from any assumption of guilt or liability of the clinicians. They have my sympathy. They were placed in a perilous and impossible predicament.

Savita is a specific and tragic case that happened to be disclosed. My interest goes beyond the specifics of Savita’s case. We have bad and pernicious Constitutional law which can only be revoked by a Referendum. As a citizen, I request a Referendum on this issue of safety of the lives of some pregnant women. We would not be in this predicament except for Article 40.3.3 of the Constitution.

Too bad they did not have same panel of experts when this woman needed help. Now time for typical public show and I will be surprised if they agree that medical error was made.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=faZj8L5pqGw&feature=related … 20,000 at this protest in Dublin ;a lot were men

HSE investigations are almost always inconclusive and very rarely apportion blame, that could be why people feel this may also be the outcome in this particular case. A good indication of the future outcomes are past outcomes.

You can’t seriously believe that there isn’t any likelyhood of basis when 3 of the board members work at the hospital whos reputation is on the line. Future reputations, career prospects, monetary prospects and social prospects may be linked to the outcome of this investigation; no person is infallible and it at best extremely naive to think otherwise.

Andrew
Not alone is your view cynically ignorant but it’s also an insults to everyone on the Committee including the highly renowned and respected Chairman. You should be man enough to apologize for your hasty comment.