Thousands expected to march in memory of boy who shun spotlight on spinal surgery waiting list scandal
David Raleigh
Thousands of people are expected to march on the streets of Dublin City, Saturday, calling on the government to tackle consistent, prolonged waiting lists for spinal surgery for children once and for all.
The #JusticeForHarvey march, assembling from 2 pm at the Garden of Remembrance, Parnell Square, and walking to Customs House, is being organised by disability rights advocacy group, Access for All Ireland, following the death of Dublin boy, nine-year-old Harvey Morrison, three weeks ago.
Harvey’s parents said their son was failed by Children’s Health Ireland (CHI) which was in charge of providing their son’s hospital care.
Harvey had waited years for spinal surgery to correct scoliosis (curving) of his spine. His mother Gillian Sherratt discovered in August 2024 that her son’s name had inexplicably vanished from CHI’s active surgery waiting list.
Ms Sherratt and her husband Stephen Morrison said CHI has still not provided them with an adequate answer or reason as to why their son’s name had disappeared from the waiting list.
Throughout his life Harvey’s scoliosis was twisting and crushing his ribcage putting massive pressure on his lungs and heart.
The boy eventually had spinal surgery before last Christmas but as his curve had stretched to 130 degrees, a life-threatening spinal curve, it could not be fully corrected.
His parents said that despite Harvey starting to thrive after his surgery his health suddenly nosedived last month and he died on July 29th.
Last Wednesday, in the wake of data provided by the HSE showing almost 11,000 children we’re waiting for engagement with the HSE’s Children Disability Network Teams, including over 7,000 that were waiting for their first contact with CDNT, Mr Morrison said: “All I can really say is that Harvey was abandoned by local disability services in 2019 and we haven't really seen them since.”
Harvey who was born with spina bifida and developing scoliosis was also non-verbal and required a talk device to make it assist his communication skills.
Mr Morrison said: “We waited five years for a talk device. In his nine years of life he was seen very rarely if ever. Disability services have collapsed across the country.”
“I'm not surprised by these (CDNT) numbers. What I will say is that the most complex children like Harvey have been written off. It is institutional Ableism,” added Mr Morrison.
Harvey’s parents have called on the HSE to disband the board of CHI and take over the running of children’s health services.
CHI said it hired an extra consultant spinal surgeon on August 11th to help deal with its continuing lengthy spinal surgery waiting list.
CHI said it does not comment on individual cases but on its website it stated: “We acknowledge that waiting times for patients are still too long, and we continue to work to reduce the length of time that patients are waiting for appointments.”
It said 303 spinal surgeries had been carried out and that 231 children were waiting for surgery.
The Scoliosis Advocacy Network advocacy group has disputed CHIs figures and argued that 242 children were waiting for spinal surgery, due to an additional 11 children being placed on a waiting list at the National Orthopaedic Hospital, Cappagh.
In a fresh statement issued to this reporter, the Department of Children, Disability and Equality (DCDE), said: The Government acknowledges the challenges faced by parents of children with additional needs in accessing assessments and vital therapy services.”
It said “substantial effort and investment“ was being applied to “improving access to key services and interventions” for children with disabilities.
“The number of children seeking to access CDNT services has grown. 44,232 children are on open CDNT caseloads in June 2025 which is an increase of 9.2% on the same period in 2023,” it added.
“Significantly in the context of this growth, there has been a 33.7% decrease in the number of children on CDNT waiting lists for the same period, down from 16,522 in June 2023 to 10,961 in June 2025.”
The department said it was improving the number of offers of initial contact with CDNT, and that “16,018 children and/or their parents were offered an initial contact, one or more individual and/or group interventions in June 2025, compared with 12,598 in December 2024”.
It said 1,205 children “and/or their families participated in one or more individual and/or group intervention appointments in June, up from 722 children in December 2024”.
The department argued that, despite the waiting lists, there has been “key improvements” in CDNT delivery and staffing, adding that the “CDNT workforce has increased to 1866 Filled Whole Time Equivalents (WTE)” representing “a year-on-year growth of 17% from October 2023 figures”.
However, acknowledging severe gaps in the CDNT system the DCDE said: “it is evident that more needs to be done to fully staff the CDNTs and to achieve the level, quality and types of service that is expected.”
It said that Government funding had been provided “for additional” staff to “enhance capacity” and “shorten waiting times”.
“A total of €3.2 billion has been allocated for Disability Services in Budget 2025, which represents an overall increase since 2020 of €1.2bn.”
Gillian Sherratt and Stephen Morrison called on Taniaste Simon Harris to resign from politics following his pledge in 2017, while he was Minister for Health, that no child would wait longer than four months for spinal surgery.
Their son had been earmarked for spinal surgery for almost all of his nine years, and he was on CHI’s active waiting list for more than three years.
Mr Harris said in response that any decision to perform surgery on Harvey was a clinical one and not a political one.
In a post on X, on Friday, Gillian Sherratt asked people attending Saturday’s march in Dublin
to keep the rally “flag and banner free” in an effort to have the focus of the march on change for children needing timely access to orthopaedic surgery.
“Of course #JusticeForHarvey signage is fine! Or if your own child has been failed or is continuing to be failed feel free to include that,” she said.
“Let’s show up, let’s show up for Harvey, and for all the other families continuing to be let down by the dysfunctional @CHI_Ireland and the state. #JusticeForHarvey #ResignHarris,” Ms Sherratt added.
The Clondalkin mother of three thanked people “for the massive amount of support we have been shown since Harvey’s passing”.
She asked that Saturday’s march “be a peaceful” one, “as anything less than that would not only discredit our cause, but it would tarnish our beautiful boy’s name”.
“It’s three weeks since my heart and world shattered. With each passing day I miss (Harvey) even more 💔 thank you to those of you who are planning on coming to the #JusticeForHarvey march on Saturday,” Ms Sherratt said.
