Thurles Information

Sir David Attenborough Celebrates 100 Years As World Honours A Voice For Nature.

Legendary British broadcaster and natural historian Sir David Attenborough marked his 100th birthday, yesterday Friday, May 8th 2026, receiving an extraordinary wave of tributes from around the world, after more than seven decades spent bringing the wonders of nature into millions of homes.
Born on May 8th, 1926 in Isleworth, Middlesex, England, Sir David has become one of the most respected and recognisable voices in broadcasting history.

In a heartfelt audio message released by the BBC, Sir David said he had expected a quiet celebration but was deeply moved by the global response to his milestone birthday. Messages arrived from children, families, schools and care homes, reflecting the affection generations of viewers feel for the man whose storytelling transformed wildlife filmmaking.

Across Britain, celebrations were organised to honour his remarkable contribution to television and environmental awareness. The BBC scheduled a week of special programming dedicated to his life and work, while events including concerts at London’s Royal Albert Hall, museum exhibitions, nature walks and tree-planting ceremonies were held nationwide.

For over 70 years, Sir David has documented the beauty, complexity and fragility of the natural world. His groundbreaking documentaries, including Life on Earth, The Blue Planet, Frozen Planet and Dynasties, revolutionised natural history broadcasting and inspired millions to care about wildlife and conservation.

Some of his most unforgettable moments include a famous encounter with playful mountain gorillas during the filming of Life on Earth, dramatic footage of orcas hunting seals in icy waters, and his emotional narration of the story of “Lonesome George,” the final surviving Pinta Island tortoise whose death marked the extinction of his species. These powerful scenes helped audiences understand both the wonder and vulnerability of life on Earth.

In recent decades, Attenborough has become one of the world’s strongest advocates for environmental protection. His acclaimed 2017 series Blue Planet II highlighted the devastating impact of plastic pollution in the oceans and sparked public pressure for action on waste reduction and conservation measures worldwide.

Despite his global fame, colleagues and friends often describe Attenborough as modest and deeply committed to public service. Producer Mike Gunton said Attenborough viewed himself not as a celebrity, but as someone fortunate enough to speak on behalf of the natural world.

Even at 100, Attenborough remains actively involved in filmmaking. One of the latest BBC projects celebrating his centenary is Secret Garden, a series exploring the hidden wildlife thriving in Britain’s gardens and green spaces.

Attenborough’s career began at the BBC in the early 1950s, before he rose through the organisation to become a senior television executive. However, his passion for storytelling and wildlife drew him back in front of the camera, leading to the creation of Life on Earth in 1979 — the landmark series that established him as a household name around the globe.

Today, Sir David Attenborough is regarded not only as a pioneering broadcaster, but also as one of the most influential communicators of science and conservation in modern history. His work has inspired generations to appreciate the natural world and to recognise the urgent need to protect it for the future.

FSAI Provides Advice On Consumption Of Calabash Chalk.

The Food Safety Authority of Ireland (FSAI) is advising consumers, particularly pregnant women and women who are breastfeeding, not to consume calabash chalk due to the presence of high levels of lead.

Calabash chalk (also known as calabar chalk, calabar stone, la craie, argile, nzu, ndom, eko and mabele) is sometimes consumed as a traditional remedy for morning sickness. However, eating it can significantly increase exposure to lead, which is harmful, particularly to unborn babies and infants.

Lead is a toxic metal that can accumulate in the body over time and can be transferred to unborn babies during pregnancy and to infants during breastfeeding. Exposure to lead is associated with a range of adverse health effects, particularly its impact on the developing brain of unborn babies and young infants.

Calabash chalk may be naturally occurring, composed of fossilised seashells, or artificially produced from a mixture of clay, sand, wood ash and other materials. The product is imported into Ireland and can be found in some ethnic shops, typically sold in blocks, pellets or powders, often with limited labelling or consumer information.

Mr Greg Dempsey, Chief Executive, FSAI urged pregnant and breastfeeding women not to eat this product.
“High levels of lead in calabash chalk is a serious public health concern. Lead can have harmful effects, particularly for unborn babies and infants, where it can severely affect how a child’s body grows and their brain develops. At very high levels, lead poisoning can be fatal. We advise pregnant women and women who are breastfeeding not to eat this product,” said Mr Dempsey.

Women who are pregnant or breastfeeding and have consumed calabash chalk should stop using the product.

Those who feel unwell should seek medical advice.

Sheds Before Beds, Thurles Born Mikey Ryan Reports.

It was a damp Tuesday morning in Thurles when according to Mikey Ryan, he first heard whispers of “The Shed” in a conversation overheard in the Arch Bar.
From his evesdropping he learned that this was not just any shed, no, this was “THE Shed”; a €127,000 monument to human ambition; a bicycle sanctuary if you will; a stainless-steel Cathedral to two-wheeled transportation, and a structure so majestic that local lads had begun referring to it as “The Taj Ma-Cycle.”

Mikey, using his Charlie Haughey granted free travel pass, was soon to be seen standing outside University Hospital Kerry with a chicken fillet roll in one hand and existential rage in the other.

“Sweet suffering Jaysus,” he was heard to mutter, staring up at it. “For that money they could’ve built a second hospital, or at least fixed the machine in SuperValu that keeps robbing me Clubcard points.”

The bike shed shimmered in the Kerry drizzle like a spaceship designed by accountants. A gust of wind blew dramatically through Tralee town as elderly pensioners, nurses, and one confused German tourist gathered around hospital trollies, gawked in stunned silence.

“They say,” whispered young Paudie who had journeyed down with Mikey for free, having declared himself to be an Independent Travel Support assistants, “that there’s heated bolts in it.”
“Heated bolts?” said Mikey. “Heated Bolts” replied Paudie sounding like an echo. Mikey nearly fainted into a nearby puddle.

Meanwhile, inside the Dáil, panic spread quickly among the Shinners and the Peoples Before Profit Liberation Army; the announcement moving faster than free pints at an Irish wake. The Public Accounts Committee had declared the bike shed “extravagant,” which in Irish political language is only one level below “Ah now lads, come on seriously.”

Opposition politicians stormed corridors, led by Molly Loo, some carrying folders, spreadsheets, and previously unopened copies of “Value For Money For Dummies”.
One TD dramatically slapped a photograph of the shed onto a desk. “This,” he roared, “is no longer infrastructure. This is performance art.”
The controversy would soon echo the wider political fallout from the infamous Dáil bike shed saga at Leinster House, where a bicycle shelter costing more than €330,000, triggered a national debate on public procurement, value for money, and as suggested by a Tipperary Labour Deputy, should itself be classified as another UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Politicians now clutched spreadsheets like rosary beads, while ordinary citizens stared into the middle distance, calculating how many breakfast rolls, semi-detached houses, or actual bicycles could have been bought instead.
At one point, rumours spread that the shelter included heated seating, mood lighting, and a part-time Sommelier (Latter a trained, knowledgeable wine professional), necessary for assisting exhausted civil servants arriving on electric scooters.

Meanwhile, the HSE defended the project. “It’s a long-term investment,” they insisted. “Long term” barked Mikey now back in Thurles, and seated on his couch watching RTÉ. “For €127,000 that bike shed should be curing gout and baptising children.”

Rumours spiralled wildly across Kerry. Some claimed the shed had underfloor heating. Others insisted it had held its own Eircode, three civil servants, the Healy Brothers and full diplomatic immunity.
One woman swore she saw Michael Flatley emerge from it, days earlier, and at dawn surrounded in a cloud of dry ice.

Mikey Ryan was determined to uncover the truth. The next morning after a quick pint in The Arch Bar in Liberty Square, Thurles and armed only with a hi-vis Uisce Éireann jacket that he found in the boot of his cousin’s Corolla; then with the confidence of a man who once argued with a parking meter for forty minutes, he headed to Kerry to infiltrate the actual site.
Inside, silence, stillness and bicycles, just normal bicycles, including a rusty Halford’s mountain bike stood, fitted with a child’s seat covered in rainwater. Another bike stood without any cycle lock; one wheel missing entirely, so it wouldn’t be stolen.

Mikey stared in disbelief. “That’s it?” he gasped. “There’s only bikes in it? I thought there’d at least be a butler.”
Suddenly, a motion sensor light flicked on overhead with the drama of a Hollywood premiere.
Mikey froze. The shed hummed softly around him. And then, suddenly Mikey understood. This wasn’t a bike shed anymore. No, it was a facsimile of Ireland itself; overpriced; overcomplicated; mysteriously damp and somehow still held together with zip ties and taxpayer goodwill.

A single tear rolled down Mikey Ryan’s cheek. Then he looked at the polished steel beams one last time and whispered: “Wouldn’t it be grand if they put in a coffee dock though.”

And somewhere deep in Leinster House, another civil servant was quietly ordering a €94,000 umbrella stand.

History Rhymes: Mufti, Nazis, Fight Over Jewish Refugees In 1943.

“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” — Attributed to philosopher George Santayana.

Antisemitism, or prejudice and discrimination against Jewish people, has existed for centuries but has sadly seen renewed global concern in recent years due to rising hate crimes, extremist rhetoric, and worst of all, online misinformation.

An example of this is the rise in anti-Semitism and growing tensions around the Ireland v Israel soccer match, causing deep concern across Irish communities. While people have strong views on the middle east conflict, there is an urgent need for restraint, calm language, and respect for public safety. Calls for protests by poorly informed individuals around the match have increased in recent weeks, but many believe demonstrations should be halted to avoid further division, intimidation, or violence, and to ensure the focus remains on peace, dialogue, and the protection of all communities from hate crime.

“Those that fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.“ — Quote attributed to Sir Winston Churchill.

On May 6th, 1943, one of the most controversial figures in Middle Eastern history, Muslim leader Amin al-Husseini, (1897-1974), sent a letter to the Bulgarian government objecting to a proposal that would have allowed thousands of Jewish children to escape Europe and immigrate to British Mandate Palestine.
This letter remains one of the clearest documented examples of the Mufti’s▲ active collaboration with Nazi Germany and his opposition to Jewish rescue efforts during the Holocaust.

▲ Mufti: An Islamic legal scholar qualified to issue fatwas (religious decrees).

During World War II, the former Grand Mufti of Jerusalem became closely aligned with the Axis powers. After fleeing the Middle East, following anti-British unrest in Iraq, Husseini settled in Berlin, where he was welcomed by senior Nazi officials and supported by the German government.

While in Germany, he broadcast pro-Nazi and antisemitic propaganda in Arabic; encouraged resistance against Britain and the Allies; opposed all Jewish immigration to Palestine, and recruited Muslims into Waffen-SS units operating in the Balkans.
In November 1941, Husseini met directly with Adolf Hitler in Berlin. Records of the meeting show that both men discussed opposition to Jews and British influence in the Middle East.

The Bulgarian Rescue Proposal.
By 1943, reports of the mass murder of European Jews had begun spreading internationally. At the same time, efforts were underway to rescue Jewish children trapped in Nazi-controlled territory.
One proposal involved allowing approximately 4,000 Jewish children and several hundred accompanying adults to leave Bulgaria for British Mandate Palestine. Husseini strongly opposed the plan. According to historical records cited by the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum and multiple historians, he contacted German and allied officials to block the transfer.
In correspondence connected to these rescue efforts, Husseini argued that Jews should not be allowed to emigrate to Palestine and suggested they instead be sent to places where they would remain under tighter control, including Poland.

**Jews Being Deported To Treblinka 1942.**

What “Poland” Meant in 1943.
By May 1943, Nazi-occupied Poland had become the centre of the Holocaust. Extermination camps including Auschwitz-Birkenau, Treblinka, Sobibor, and Majdanek were operating there, and hundreds of thousands of Jews had already been murdered. The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising had just been crushed weeks earlier.
Children sent to Auschwitz-Birkenau,Treblinka,Sobibor,and Majdanek were primarily targeted for immediate extermination, with the vast majority murdered in gas chambers upon arrival. Jewish children were deemed “unfit for labour,” leading to instant separation from parents and death. In Auschwitz-Birkenau, over 200,000 children were killed immediately upon arrival, together with over 700 babies born there, murdered prior to late 1944.
Treblinka and Sobibor in fact were pure death camps (Operation Reinhard). Children, alongside adults, were usually sent immediately to the gas chambers upon arrival. Majdanek Functioned as both a concentration and extermination camp, where children were either immediately murdered or faced death through starvation, disease, and, in some cases, older children were kept for forced labour.

Some children were kept in “family camps” (often to be murdered later) or used for sadistic medical experiments. Only about 700 children were alive upon liberation in January 1945.

Historians generally agree that senior Nazi collaborators, such as Husseini, were aware that deportations to Poland placed Jews in grave danger, though scholars continue debating precisely how much he knew about the mechanics of the extermination process itself.

Collaboration Beyond Propaganda
Husseini’s wartime role extended beyond speeches and diplomacy. Historical documentation confirms that he worked closely with senior Nazi figures including Heinrich Himmler and Joachim von Ribbentrop. He also helped recruit Muslim volunteers for Nazi military formations in Bosnia and the Balkans.
Photographs and wartime records additionally place him visiting Nazi facilities and meeting SS leadership during the war years.
At the same time, many historians caution against exaggerating his role. Institutions such as Yad Vashem▲, note that while Husseini was unquestionably a Nazi collaborator and antisemite, there is no evidence he was one of the architects of the Holocaust itself.

▲ Yad Vashem, the World Holocaust Remembrance Centre.

The Core Message of Husseini Letter.
The May 1943 correspondence remains historically significant because it demonstrates that Husseini was not merely sympathetic to Nazi Germany in abstract political terms. He actively intervened against efforts to rescue Jewish refugees.
The central theme of the Mufti’s correspondence was unmistakable; Jewish refugees must not be allowed to reach Palestine. Historical records show that Husseini urged Axis-aligned governments to prevent Jewish emigration to the Middle East and instead redirected Jews to territories where they would remain under Nazi authority and surveillance. One of the most chilling lines associated with these communications was his recommendation that Jews be sent to countries “where they would find themselves under active control, for example, in Poland.”

For many historians and commentators, this episode illustrates how antisemitism, wartime Arab nationalism, and Nazi ideology intersected during World War II. Others caution against using Husseini’s actions to generalize about all Palestinians or all Arab political movements, noting that political views across the Arab world were never uniform.

What is beyond serious historical dispute, however, is that the Grand Mufti aligned himself with Nazi Germany, spread antisemitic propaganda, and opposed attempts to allow Jewish refugees to escape to Palestine during the Holocaust.

That aside, there is a strong current argument that sport should continue independently of politics. Supporters of that view see international sport as one of the few arenas where countries and peoples still meet under shared rules, even during periods of political conflict.
They further argue that former Ireland manager and women’s captain Brian Kerr and Louise Quinn; together with Shamrock Rovers captain Roberto Lopes; musician Christy Moore; bands Fontaines DC and Kneecap, are not elected government ministers, and that ordinary supporters should not automatically be treated as representatives of Irish State policy.
Anger tends to be most effective when it is channelled into a coherent ethical stance rather than confrontation for its own sake.
Targeting Jewish people, Israeli civilians, or individual athletes with abuse, undermines the moral credibility protesters may want/wish to project.

Bodies like UEFA and FIFA generally resist team exclusions unless there is overwhelming international consensus or direct breaches of competition rules. The FAI has publicly argued that refusing to fulfil fixtures could damage Irish football competitively and institutionally.

A Health System Measured In Corridors: UHL And North Tipperary Paying The Price.

Ireland’s trolley crisis has become more than a seasonal emergency or a political talking point. It is now a defining feature of the country’s healthcare system. The latest figures from the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation reveal a staggering reality; more than 1.7 million people have been treated without a proper hospital bed since 2006. Behind that number are exhausted patients, distressed families and healthcare workers trying to deliver care in conditions that should never have become normal.

The fact that over one million people have been placed on trolleys in just the last decade shows how dramatically the problem has escalated. Despite years of economic growth, repeated promises of reform and countless government strategies, overcrowding remains deeply embedded in hospital life across Ireland. For many patients, entering an emergency department now means preparing for the possibility of spending hours, or even days, waiting in corridors for a bed to become available.

The figures from University Hospital Limerick are particularly alarming. Nearly 195,000 people have been left on trolleys there since 2006, making it the most overcrowded hospital in the country. Crucially, UHL serves not only Limerick but large parts of the Mid-West, including North Tipperary, meaning communities across the region are directly impacted by the ongoing crisis. Cork University Hospital and University Hospital Galway have also faced enormous pressures, highlighting how widespread the overcrowding problem has become.

What makes these numbers especially troubling is the human impact behind them. Patients on trolleys often experience a complete loss of dignity, treated in open corridors with little privacy, while waiting for care. Elderly and vulnerable patients are particularly affected, while frontline nurses and midwives continue to work under immense strain trying to provide safe treatment in overcrowded conditions.

The INMO survey reveals the growing toll on healthcare staff. More than two-thirds of respondents said staffing levels were inadequate to meet patient needs, while many reported burnout, stress and declining psychological wellbeing. Alarmingly, large numbers have considered leaving their work areas because of unsafe staffing conditions, creating fears that the crisis could worsen further if experienced staff continue to leave the system.

There is increasing concern that Ireland is beginning to normalise overcrowding in hospitals. Yet no modern healthcare system should accept corridors and trolleys as routine treatment spaces. Despite economic growth over the past two decades, many patients still face unacceptable waiting conditions when they are most vulnerable.

The warning from the INMO is not simply about statistics. It is a stark reminder that the healthcare system remains under severe pressure and that patients and staff across regions such as North Tipperary continue to pay the price for a crisis that has gone unresolved for far too long.