There is currently no active sexual health strategy for Ireland. The previous strategy was launched a decade ago by Leo Varadkar when he was Minister for Health. We have long been promised a new strategy but it has not been delivered. For the third year we are lacking a comprehensive strategy or vision for sexual health. The sexual health services are thin on the ground and starved of resources. Will the Minister of State commit to prioritising sexual health? When will this long overdue strategy be published?

Sexual health is a priority for this Government. Following expert advice, the second national sexual health strategy underwent an additional round of stakeholder consultation and feedback, which is now complete. The good news is that the strategy was approved to progress to design stage at the end of last week. Once design is completed, the strategy will be submitted for ministerial and Government approval, then launched. It will be launched quite soon. The strategy will be supported by an action plan that will map out implementation in more detail for the first three years of its term.

HIV and STI rates have been rising both nationally and internationally. Consequently, we allocated funding of €550,000 for 2025 to support the HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis scheme, bringing the total allocation for HIV PrEP to €6.45 million. This funding includes €200,000 for additional PrEP drugs and €350,000 for additional staffing in public STI clinics providing PrEP from July 2025. These measures will increase capacity for in-person PrEP appointments. Furthermore, an additional €600,000 has been allocated to support the free STI home-testing scheme, bringing funding for STI home-testing to €4.82 million in 2025.

A lot of work has been done on this and I assure the Deputy that this will be done as soon as possible when we get the go-ahead.

The rates of gonorrhoea and chlamydia had reduced slightly by the end of 2024 in comparison with the last two years. Better access to testing may be reducing onward infections. The national sexual health strategy supports positive sexual health information. It will have education, research, prevention and information, particularly on stigma. All this will be in the strategy.

In her opening response the Minister of State mentioned PrEP, which could be a game-changer for HIV. The same is true for PEP and rapid testing. It can take 18 months for someone to be seen in a PrEP clinic in this country. In Dublin, over 1,000 people are waiting for an appointment at one of the PrEP clinics. It took a year and a half to replace the nurse specialist in the South Infirmary in Cork. At the same time, the UK has same-day walk-in clinics and screenings. We can talk about increased funding but the services are not there, particularly on PrEP. We have seen that 39% of new HIV infections were late diagnosis. We now know that 50% of the transmissions are among heterosexuals. Both these findings result in poor outcomes and the likelihood of ongoing HIV transmission. With these kinds of results there is a serious risk that we will not reach that target of eliminating new HIV infections by 2030.

Great work is being done by some of the NGOs and some of the people working in sexual health, but the services and funding are not there. We need the new strategy and we need to protect sexual health because it has been neglected for far too long.

The funding includes €200,000 for additional PrEP drugs and €350,000 for additional staffing in public STI clinics providing PrEP from July 2025. I understand the Deputy's concerns. As I said, this strategy is urgent for us. I assure him that hopefully in the next few weeks or maybe two or three months, I will definitely come back to him with this strategy. As he said, education and information are really important. Stigma is a big issue that we need to address. I will be delighted to work with the Deputy and do whatever I can to help and support him.