Shingles Vaccination Programme: Motion Seanad Éireann — 2026-02-05 ============================================================ Gerard P. Craughwell (IND), Labour Panel The weekend Pope John Paul II died will never leave my mind. It was not because I had any great affinity for His Holiness. Rather, it was because it was after a week's conference when I was in Rosslare as president of the Teachers' Union of Ireland. I had a pain in my back all week. On the night I arrived in Rosslare, His Holiness was dying and I sat in a chair in absolute agony. Nothing I could do would ease the pain. I spent the entire night awake and the following morning I left Rosslare at about 6.30 a.m. By the time I got to St. Columcille's Hospital, Loughlinstown, I was unable to be in any way cognisant of what was going on around me. I spent two days in the hospital under complete sedation. The level of pain I experienced was something I have never experienced before or since. Half of my torso was covered in shingles front to back. The pain was so excruciating that I moved into one bedroom in the house and after three days in it I thought I was going mad. I finished up lying on the floor of my sitting room for six weeks trying to find a position that would be comfortable. Nothing I could do would make the pain go away. More importantly, I still get a twinge every now and then and I think it is coming back. If it ever comes back, I do know not know what I will do. It is absolutely horrendous. I have never known anything like it. The virus follows nerve lines. I was told at the time that if I got it in the face, it could cost me my sight. It is an horrendous condition. As all my colleagues pointed out, there is a relationship between it and chickenpox. I now have three beautiful granddaughters and if I hear of any of them having chickenpox, I will not go near them until they are well and truly clear of it. Senator Conway has done a lot of work on this and his presentation was fantastic. It is worth restating that the UK, Germany, Greece, Italy, Luxembourg, Spain, Cyprus, Australia and New Zealand have all adopted the vaccine. It is also worth stating that there is some correlation between Alzheimer's, dementia more generally and shingles. There has been a reduction of up to 20% in the risk of dementia, including Alzheimer's, as a result of vaccination against shingles. When one gets to the latter stage of life where I am now, the thoughts of dementia, including Alzheimer's, scares the living hell out of me. If there was anything out there that would help reduce that risk, dear God, please give it to me. The Minister of State is frequently put in the firing line over decisions made by the HSE. One of my asks today is that she get the HSE to publish its research on this and give an explanation as to why the vaccine was deemed to not be cost effective. I do not know why we always end up throwing Ministers under the bus for decisions made by bureaucrats. It was not a bureaucrat in the Department of Health but rather a HSE decision. Let it publish the information. We had this debate over the RSV vaccine, another vital vaccine for people aged in their late 60s and early 70s. It has resulted in a massive reduction in the number of hospitalisations of people suffering from the respiratory diseases that come with RSV. From that point of view, it is something we need to do. But for Senator Conway bringing this forward, it would have gone under the radar and nobody would have taken much notice of it. I congratulate my colleague for bringing forward the motion and the amount of work he has done on it. I do not think it is fair to blame the Department of Health, the Minister or, indeed, the office of the Minister of State. I do not think that was ever intended by Senator Conway. I congratulate Senator Ahearn for pointing out that the Government is behind the motion. We seem to have a unanimity in here and everybody seems to be singing from the same hymn sheet. I do not want to delay this any longer. Let us see what GSK, the manufacturers of the vaccine, and the HSE are saying. Let us see the research that went into deciding whether the vaccine was cost effective. If that research stands up, we may have to examine another way around this problem. When the HSE makes statements to the effect that something is not cost effective, it needs to be able to back that up by publishing its research. It is not fair to ask Ministers to come to the House and defend something in which they have no hand, act or part. I am particularly concerned about over-50s. I was in my 50s when I got it and my father was in his 60s. I am also concerned about those who are immunocompromised. The Minister of State knows from a debate we had here that my daughter is immunocompromised due to head and neck cancer. People who had breast, prostate or bowel cancer are immunocompromised for the rest of their lives. If we can do something to make their lives more certain, then we should do that. I do not think there will be a need for votes or anything else on this. There is total support for it. I thank the Minister of State for being here. Once again, I am sorry she is one who gets to carry the can. I thank her for her time. --- Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted. Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-02-05/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:35+00:00 Sitting date: 2026-02-05