A critically ill Cork mother is this evening en route from Cork Airport to London in an air ambulance for a vital liver transplant operation.
Doctors took the decision to transfer Ms Sylvia O'Leary (32), from Ballincollig earlier today. She has spent several years battling against hepatitis C which she contacted from contaminated blood.
Ms O'Leary was at the centre of controversy earlier this week after her family accused the Department of Health of delaying payment of a compensation package believed to be worth about €1 million.
She has been on a life-support machine at Cork University Hospital since December 21st last following partial liver and kidney failure.
Surgeons at King's College Hospital in London plan to carry out the transplant as soon as her condition is stabilised.
This will be Ms O'Leary's third liver transplant operation at the hospital, the others being in 1991 and last March. It was during the first of these operations that she contracted hepatitis C through a unit of contaminated blood.
The State was considered liable for the infection because Ms O'Leary was under its care at the time.