Patients want contingency plan for insurance row

PATIENTS’ representatives have called for plans to avoid preventable deaths when services are withdrawn in an insurance row.

A statement last night from the Irish Patients’ Association (IPA) called on the Department of Health and consultants to draw up emergency plans and to have them scrutinised by “independent foreign experts to ensure that preventable deaths and injures do not occur as a result of this commercial dispute”.

Health Minister Micheál Martin has already warned that consultants will jeopardise the care of patients if they withdraw services.