Doctors must repay medical card error money

DOCTORS will have to repay millions wrongly given to them for treating up to 20,000 medical card patients who were either dead or ineligible, the Department of Health insisted last night.

The massive overpayments came to light after an investigation into the Government’s decision to give the medical card to everyone over 70 ended up costing 51 million euro over budget.

Administrative difficulties led to the overpayments to general practitioners (GPs) and it is expected to be sorted out shortly, a department spokeswoman said.