MINISTER FOR COMMUNICATIONS Patrick O’Donovan has taken ill at an event in Limerick this afternoon and has been taken by ambulance to hospital.

O’Donovan was chairing an informal meeting of EU communications ministers when he became unwell and an ambulance was called. 

A spokesperson for the minister said this afternoon in a statement: “The minister became unwell during the EU informal meeting at the University of Limerick and has been taken off site for assessment and treatment.”

A department spokesperson said there would be no further comment at this time.

The minister returned to work in September after a period of illness over the summer. 

In July, O’Donovan, who has been open about his struggle with epilepsy, became unwell and was hospitalised in Belgium before being flown back to Ireland on the government’s private jet a few days later. 

Over the weekend, it was reported in the Sunday Times  that he did not travel to an EU meeting in Strasbourg last Thursday due to illness. 

Speaking to reporters earlier this afternoon at the same event, O’Donovan hit out at quotes from anonymous government ministers about his health in last weekend’s Sunday papers, describing them as “hurtful” and “the ultimate betrayal”.

He said the comments, some from colleagues who questioned his competency following a series of public rows involving O’Donovan around this year’s budget, were a “slap in the face”. 

“I do think bringing a person’s health into public discourse in the manner in which it was, through an anonymous source, is something that I haven’t seen before,” he said.

“To be honest about it, was quite hurtful, and I have to say that I came out, for want of a better word, with regards to my epilepsy, for a very good reason – that I didn’t want to have a situation where when I did stutter, that someone would accuse me of, for instance, being drunk.”

O’Donovan said the commentary was not just a “slap in the face” to him, but to all people who “have to live with conditions far worse than mine and conditions far more difficult than mine”.