UK’s exit ‘may risk funding for child heart op scheme’

FUNDING for a cross-border scheme offering life-saving heart surgery to babies and children from the North could be jeopardised by Brexit, one of the country’s leading paediatric cardiologists has warned.

As many as 200 children, some newborn babies needing urgent surgery for congenital heart disease, have benefited from the €30million-€40million initiative whereby treatment is delivered at Our Lady’s Children’s Hospital in Crumlin, Dublin.

However, Dr Paul Oslizlok has said Brexit is a worry and ‘is a cause for concern because nobody quite knows what it is really going to mean in terms of finances back and forth and how that [Brexit] will impact on them.’ He was speaking in advance of the All Island Congenital Heart Disease Network conference in Belfast yesterday. Established three years ago, the network has helped services expand at Crumlin hospital where babies and children from the North, as well as the Republic, are treated.

The scheme involves the two healthcare systems working together to deliver care to sick children in a networked way.

An all-island solution was recommended after a report found the service provided at the Royal Belfast Hospital for Sick Children was safe but not sustainable.

Dr Oslizlok said the initiative was extremely important: ‘These are babies that... if you decide to put them on a plane... to England they very likely would not make that journey.’