Mesh victims deserve justice

The wheelchairs and walking sticks said it all as Renfrewshire’s Olive McIlroy, her campaigning partner Elaine Holmes and many more women whose lives have been shattered by mesh implants arrived at the Scottish Parliament. They were at Holyrood for a valuable evidence session held by the Public Petitions Committee. Despite their own pain and suffering these two brave women have led the campaign to highlight the problems the implants cause. They want justice but they also want to stop any more women having their health taken away by the mesh implants. Months ago they were given an assurance from Government Ministers that this practice would stop, only to find out that surgeons are still fitting them. The medical regulators claimed there is no problem. Yet in a video conferencing link with United States, lawyer Adam Slater, he revealed there are 7,000 court cases pending from women in the state of New Jersey alone. I’m glad that the Petitions Committee has decided it wants to hear more from the Scottish Government. The campaign of the Scottish Mesh Survivors is dubbed “Hear our Voice” and thanks to Olive and Elaine and others, Scottish women are forcing politicians to do just that. The Scottish Government cannot continue to send out mixed messages. As a wheelchair-bound campaigner said, “The women here today are all the evidence the Government needs to know that mesh is destroying lives.” It’s time the Scottish Government listened to Olive, Elaine and the hundreds of other victims.