Each year in Ireland around 250 women are diagnosed with cervical cancer. Recently, Health Minister James Reilly announced that there would be an extension of the cervical cancer vaccination (CCV) programme which will begin in September of this year. In a statement issued about the extension of the programme, Minister Reilly maintained that “the wonder of a vaccine that can prevent cancer cannot be underestimated and the great opportunity and protection it confers should not be missed”.

Spontaneous miscarriage is the most common complication of pregnancy and occurs in up to one-fifth of clinical pregnancies, equating to around 15,000 miscarriages each year in Ireland. Last month, the HSE published the National Miscarriage Misdiagnosis Review Report, which looked at cases of misdiagnosis of miscarriage that occurred in the past five years.

Questions over hormone therapy and its role in breast cancer risk hit the spotlight again last week, after conflicting opinions on the issue were published following new results from the large, US Government-funded Women’s Health Initiative (WHI) trial programme.

Currently, the UK is mulling over whether to legislate a fertility treatment that could prevent some incurable diseases being inherited in children.