Pregnant women and new mothers in Ireland who are dealing with mental health difficulties are not being properly reached by services, according to reporting by the Irish Examiner. The outlet says these women are "falling through the cracks," a phrase it used in its headline. The same story was carried by BreakingNews.ie.
A separate Irish Examiner report, cited alongside the first, found that suicide is the leading cause of late maternal deaths. Late maternal deaths are deaths that occur after the standard period counted in maternal mortality figures, which means the risks facing women in the months after birth can be missed by routine tracking.
Taken together, the two reports point to a gap between the mental health needs of women during pregnancy and after giving birth, and the services available to identify and support them. The Irish Examiner does not, in the material available, set out the number of women affected or name the specific services involved.
The reports were published on Saturday, 19 September 2026. No further detail on the findings, the data behind them, or any response from health authorities was included in the source material.
What to watch next: whether Irish health authorities respond to the findings and set out any planned changes to perinatal mental health services.