Donie's Ireland daily news BLOG Friday

A second Irish woman challenges Ireland’s abortion laws at the United Nations

   

Siobhán Whelan says she felt demeaned asking hospital staff about termination after learning baby had fatal foetal abnormality. 

Pro-choice supporters demonstrate outside the Irish parliament in Dublin last July ahead of a vote to introduce limited abortion.

An Irish woman who claims to have been demeaned by doctors when she asked for an emergency abortion is to take her case against the Republic to the United Nations.

Siobhán Whelan said she was made feel as if it “was illegal” to ask Irish medical staff if she could have the option of an abortion after learning in September 2009 that her baby would die.

On Thursday, backed by the New York-based Centre For Reproductive Rights, Whelan became the second Irish woman to file a challenge at the UN against the ban on abortions for medical reasons.

The centre has filed a petition with the UN human rights committee to hold Ireland accountable for subjecting Whelan to inhuman and degrading treatment, interfering with her privacy and discrimination on the basis of her gender.

The committee cannot impose a sanction on Ireland but the centre hopes to keep global pressure on its legislators.

Although limited abortion was introduced in the Republic last year, women cannot get terminations in Irish hospitals if they discover they are suffering from fatal foetal abnormalities when pregnant.

After about 21 weeks into her pregnancy Whelan was told by medics at Dublin’s National Maternity hospital that her baby had a fatal anomaly, called Trisomy 13.

She said one doctor told her she would be have been offered a termination in another jurisdiction, but that this was not possible in Ireland.

Whelan said another doctor handed her a report of the scan suggesting she would need it if she decided to travel overseas to have a termination.

But she claimed that staff did not do anything to enable her to contact a UK hospital and did not explain what a termination entailed. Additionally, the medics never mentioned what support she could expect post-diagnosis, she said.

Whelan decided that ending the pregnancy was the best choice for her and her family. She added that her husband had to arrange for time off work and for childcare, as well as find the necessary funds to pay for travel, accommodation and the procedure at the Fetal Assessment Centre at Liverpool Women’s hospital.

Johanna Westeson, regional director for Europe at the Centre For Reproductive Rights, said: “Ireland’s harsh policies made Siobhán fearful to even ask about her options and allowed her healthcare providers to give up on her once she made the decision to end her pregnancy. The UN human rights committee should act swiftly and call on Ireland to expand woman’s access to abortion care as demanded under human rights law.”

Whelan said on Thursday: “The Irish doctors made me feel like it was illegal to discuss the option of termination for fear of having the door slammed in my face or of not receiving any help whatsoever.

“I will never understand why I had to pack my bags and leave Ireland so I could access the medical care I needed. It is truly demeaning and I will never forget it.”

A clairvoyant, a stone crusher and a tax specialist on Tax defaulters list

 

Revenue Commissioners top 100-strong list defaulters made settlements totalling a whopping €13.77 million. 

A clairvoyant, a stone crusher and a taxation service provider were just some of the unusual or unlikely professions to feature on the latest tax defaulters’ list.

The 100-strong list, published today by the Revenue Commissioners, made settlements totalling €13.77 million.

Carol Byrne, a clairvoyant based in Co Wexford, made a settlement of €163,000 with Revenue for the under declaration of VAT and income tax.

Michael Reidy, a stone crusher from Co Tipperary, made a settlement of €122,000 also for the under declaration of VAT.

Accountant and taxation service provider Yaw Dankwa of Unit 4, Drogheda Business Park, Donore Road in Drogheda made a settlement for €38,359 which related to a penalty determination by the courts for the under declaration of VAT and income tax.

The rest of the list, which covers the three-month period to the end of December, was dominated by medical practitioners, restaurateurs, nursing home operators and building contractors.

The biggest settlement on the list was by Cork heating and plumbing contractor Barry Murphy for €991,000, which included just under €495,000 in interest and penalties, arising out of the under declaration of income tax and VAT.

The second highest settlement was made by Mulleady Civil Engineering Limited in Co Longford for €762,125, which included €458,000 in interest and penalties, arising out of the under-declaration of VAT and relevant contracts tax.

A Co Wicklow motor dealer trading as Fargo LeisureLimited made a settlement for €559,000 arising out of the under-declation of VAT, PAYE and PRSI.

Of the 100 published cases, five exceeded €500,000 and 38 were for amounts exceeding €100,000.

Four cases, yielding €0.47 million, related to the Revenue’s investigation into offshore funds.

Euro small copper to face the axe as one and two cent coins successful trial shows

 

Group recommends doing away with coppers after successful trial. 

Could we be about to see the end of the one and two cent coins?

A new trial by the National Payments Plan suggests their days are numbered.

A trial run for rounding cash transactions to the nearest five cent amount took place last year in Wexford between September and November in Wexford. According to the National Payments Plan, the trial revealed widespread support among both consumers and retailers for the scheme, and the steering committee has recommended to the Minister of Finance that symmetrical rounding is rolled out nationally on a voluntary basis for both consumers and retailers.

“The results of the trial were clear. The answer from Wexford was a resounding ‘yes’. When ‘don’t knows’ are excluded, 85 per cent of consumers and 100 per cent of retailers surveyed believe rounding should be applied nationally,” said NPP programme manager Ronnie O’Toole.

He moved to reassure consumers worried that the move would lead to a rise in prices.

“Rounding only applies to total bills, not to the prices of individual goods. Quite simply, the price of almost all goods tracked over the nine weeks of the trial remained unchanged,” he said.

If Ireland chooses to adopt the rounding system, we will join five other EU member states, including theNetherlands, Sweden, Finland, Denmark and Hungary, who have already put a similar system in place. Belgium, meanwhile, is currently in the process of adopting it.

The small denomination coins cost more to mint than their face value, and carry a higher cost to the Central Bank due to transport and storage. They also go out of circulation quickly due to stockpiling.

22 year old Woman with anorexia will continue to be fed through tube after gaining some weight

   

The President of the High Court made the decision after hearing the 22-year-old had gained weight. 

A young woman who suffers from the eating disorder anorexia nervosa is to be fed through a tube in hospital for another period, the President of the High Court has decided after being told she has gained weight.

The 22-year-old woman has reached a weight of 37.9kg and may be in a position to proceed to a new weight maintenance programme once she reaches her 40kg target, Mr Justice Nicholas Kearns was told.

Peter Finlay SC, for the HSE, said it was agreed that the court order permitting tube feeding, first granted last January, was a “life-saving” exercise.

The multi-disciplinary team looking after the woman plan, once she reaches 40kg and her BMI is 15, to put a programmme in place for weight maintenance, he said.

That programme would last eight to ten weeks after which the HSE wished the court to reassess the situation in relation to whether the feeding order should stay in place. The order remains in place pending further court order.

Michael Ramsey SC, for the woman, said there was no doubt the progress made had been excellent and the woman believed the court order and the work of the multi-disciplinary team had saved her life.

However, counsel added, the woman felt “voiceless” at each court hearing to assess her progress and wanted the court to consider suspending the feeding order for seven days to allow her proceed to the weight maintenance programme.

In light of that application, Mr Justice Kearns asked the consultant psychiatrist treating the woman to outline her opinion as to whether the woman was ready for the maintenance programme.

The psychiatrist said the woman has become distressed in the last few weeks by her weight gain and her blood pressure and glucose levels were also not yet stable. In her view, the woman’s body was not ready for the maintenance progeramme and it was too early to consider it at this stage, the psychiatrist said.

Prior to the granting of the court order, the woman did not believe she was going to die but she has now learned the feeding process is essential to live, the psychiatrist added.

Mr Justice Kearns said he would continue the order and will review the case on May 9th. The judge also asked the psychiatrist to pass on words of encouragement to the woman to the effect, if she achieves the weight gain target, the team will work with her in the maintenance programme.

The judge added he would read the corerespondence handed into the court from the woman which, her counsel said, was written in sequence through the feeding programme and showed how her insight into her condition has improved.

The court made the tube-feeding order in January after it heard the woman had refused four out of seven oral nutritional supplements in one 24 hour period. Due to her low body weight, which in January stood at 32.8kg with a BMI of 12.2, she ran the risk of collapse, it was stated.

Half of fixed broadband homes in Ireland now have speeds greater than 10 Mbps

    

Half of fixed broadband homes in Ireland now at speeds greater than 10Mbps. 

Average broadband speeds in Ireland have increased, with 53.4% of all fixed broadband subscriptions over 10Mbps at the end of last year, ComReg said in its latest quarterly review.

This is up from 31.5% in the fourth quarter of 2012.

ComReg says that around a third of all fixed broadband connections in Ireland are now up over 30Mbps.

In terms of average broadband penetration in Ireland, ComReg reports Ireland is now at 67% fixed and mobile penetration.

Looking at next-generation technologies, like fibre-to-the-cabinet (VDSL), ComReg claims there are now 74,540 VDSL broadband subscriptions in Ireland. Eircom aims to pass 1m homes by this summer with VDSL capable of reaching speeds of up to 100Mbps.

MOBILE PENETRATION NOW AT 122%

The mobile market accounted for about 74.1% of all voice and internet subscriptions (fixed and mobile), with fixed market subscriptions (voice and internet) representing the remaining 25.9%.

The number of texts sent continues to decline as consumers’ mobile data usage intensifies.

The total number of SMS messages sent by mobile users in Ireland was more than 2.15bn in Q4 2013, down 27.6% on Q4 2012. Data volumes continue to rise, increasing by 43.7% in the year to Q4 2013 to reach just over 12,273 terabytes.

ComReg estimates that industry retail revenues in Q4 2013 were €788.4m, which was a 0.1% decrease since Q3 2013.

Total industry retail revenues in the 12 months to December 2013 at €3.15bn were down from more than €3.24bn over the previous 12 months.

In Q4 2013, Average Revenue Per User (ARPU) in the mobile sector was €27 per month, down from €29 compared to Q4 2012.

ComReg says the drop in ARPU is due, in part, to lower-priced mobile plans and increased sales of bundled products, combined reductions in mobile roaming and termination rates.

There were 5,626,398 mobile phone subscriptions at the end of December, which was an increase of 0.2pc on the previous quarter. Ireland’s mobile penetration rate for the quarter was 122.2%.

ESO’s Very Large Telescope spots a hypergiant yellow star

    

The European Space Observatory’s Very Large Telescope (VLT) has spotted a massive yellow star with a diameter of more than 1,300 times the size of the Sun. The star is also a part of a binary system, with a companion star orbiting so close that it is actually in physical contact with the giant.

The truly massive nature of the stellar behemoth, imaginatively named HR 5171 A [1], was discovered due to detailed imaging by the ESO’s Very Large Telescope Interferometer (VLTI).

The VLT itself is not a single telescope, but comprises four Unit Telescopes, each boasting an impressive 8.2 m (26 ft) diameter main mirror. In addition to this, the VLT has four mobile 1.8 m (5.9 ft) auxiliary telescopes. Interferometry essentially allows the light collected from all four main telescopes as well as the auxiliaries, to be combined, creating one giant 140 m (459 ft) telescope.

HR 5171 A [1] is the largest of a very rare category of star known as a yellow hypergiant. These stars are generally extremely unstable and represent some of the brightest stars that we know of. The unstable nature of the star manifests physically with the regular expulsion of massive amounts of stellar material, causing the star to have a large extended atmosphere.

HR 5171 A [1] is roughly 50 percent larger than the red supergiantBetelgeuse. Sitting 12,000 light-years away from earth, HR 5171 A [1] has an astonishing diameter of more than 1,300 times our own star, and is over a million times brighter.

However, even with the yellow hypergiant’s incredible size making it one of the top ten largest stars ever discovered, it cannot compare to some of the biggest stars on record. For example, the red supergiant UY Scuti is a veritable leviathan with a diameter of 1,708 times that of our Sun.

It must be noted that references to the size of these monster stars are subject to significant margins of error. This is due to the fact that the size of the stars cannot be discovered via direct observation and must instead be inferred with measurements of brightness, temperature and distance.

It is not just the sheer size of HR 5171 A [1] that makes it such a rare and beautiful find. Regarding the unique nature of the star, Olivier Chesneau of the Observatoire de la Côte d’Azur, Nice, France, said that “The new observations also showed that this star has a very close binary partner, which was a real surprise,” going on to say that, “The two stars are so close that they touch and the whole system resembles a gigantic peanut.”

The existence of the companion star was verified with observations from other observatories, with data suggesting that the small star orbits its massive parent once every 1,300 days.

HR 5171 A [1] has actually been observed for around 60 years prior to being imaged by the VLTI, but no-one had previously known how truly massive it was. It’s also been growing over the last 40 years, with the star cooling as it enlarges. Further observations of the changing star will undoubtedly grant a fascinating insight into the evolution of these stellar giants.