Scairbh
Na
gCaorach
EMYVALE
Have I really Gone Mad?
A few days ago we heard that this Government was going to begin the process of providing FREE GP services for the people of Ireland. This was to begin with long-term illnesses and then rolled out for all. The HSE cannot manage the provision of existing services with the current budgets given to them and ‘there is no money’ according to the Minister for those over budget. So we wondered where the money was going to come from for the GPs.
We then heard that the Government was going to give some extra money to some hospitals to help them out. Did this come from the mysterious €3.6billion? Then we hear the real news. Anyone applying for a medical card will have to pay €50, anyone on a medical card will have to pay €1 instead of 50c for prescriptions, the cost of attending A & E will rise from €100 as it is at the moment, more hospital beds will be closed, more public nursing homes will close, home care will only receive 50% of present payments, etc etc. So, in order to make free GP services available to all, even those who can well afford them, the Government is going to raise the money by taking it from the least well-off, the poorest, the most disadvantaged, those most exposed. But then should we be surprised when we see that they would allow senior citizens, who are spending the final years of their lives in a nursing home, to be uprooted and taken to a strange place miles away from their families and yet claim that none of these patients will suffer. Will someone please waken me from this nightmare or have I gone mad?!!
What is this Government trying to do with our health system? It looks more and more that they are trying to get the private sector to take over. They are trying to drive patients into private medicine. But then the cost of private health insurance is rising through the roof and the benefits are being cut. Over 23,000 people have ceased paying for health insurance this year. More and more people cannot afford it and fewer will be able to pay the premia after the other budgetary increases are announced – like property tax, VAT increase, fuel increases, green taxes, motor tax increases, sick pay to be paid by employers, €10 off child allowances, cuts in other benefits, etc etc. More and more people will rely on the public system which will not be able to provide what is needed. It cannot do it now as 33 patients on trolleys in Cavan and 30 on Trolleys in Drogheda proves.
As for our Minister – well we have lost faith there too. Ms. Harney refused to meet with the Alliance and we always received the same reply to our emails – ‘the Minister wishes to inform you that the matter is receiving attention’. Weeks ago and twice we have requested the Minister to give us the names of those he appointed to the Review Group, which is tasked with looking at the viability and sustainability of setting up a MAU in Monaghan General Hospital. Twice we received the customary reply –‘the matter is receiving attention’. How difficult is it to ask a secretary to copy the names into an email and return to us immediately? There is another message there which we are not getting. We need to use alternative methods if we want results.