Medical cards will be processed in 15 days, vows Harney

ELDERLY patients will have their medical card applications processed in 15 days, Health Minister Mary Harney has promised following concern that a new centralised system left over-70s waiting up to four months for their entitlement to free health care.

Ms Harney took almost six months to reply to demands for action from the Oireachtas Health Committee, who said a central applications system had made older people worried and under financial stress.

The Health Committee wrote to the minister last March demanding “urgent action” after applications had gone missing since the system was centralised in Finglas, Dublin, and older people were left on phone lines for more than 30 minutes without answers on their applications.

In February, Ms Harney appeared before the committee and was told how one 85-year-old man had taken a taxi to the central office with all his documentation only for it to get lost.

On another occasion, gardaí were called because “people became so irate with the bureaucracy”.

Ms Harney responded to the committee yesterday, promising waiting times of no more than 15 days in future and allowing local health staff access to the database to inform people of the status of their applications.

The promise of reduced waiting times was welcomed by Labour’s health spokesperson Jan O’Sullivan, who had opposed further centralisation of medical card applications to cover all age groups until the problems with the over-70s system were resolved.

She said while she would have preferred it to happen quicker, the committee achieved what it had set out to do.

“People’s economic circumstances can change very quickly, through, for instance, the loss of a job, and they should be entitled to apply for and receive a medical card within a reasonable time period.”

Ms O’Sullivan said the committee would be closely watching the situation to ensure that the promises made by Ms Harney are fulfilled. “It is also important that there continues to be a human dimension to the decision making process that can take account of individual circumstances,” she said.

Committee chairman Seán O Fearghaíl (Fianna Fáil) said they will monitor the situation “to ensure that improvements are maintained when the application process for all medical cards is centralised later this year”.