Healthcare plan focuses on prevention

GIVING people a better start in life to reduce the risk of chronic disease will form part of a Government initiative aimed at improving the country’s general standard of health.

Health Minister James Reilly said Ireland’s acute hospital system had become the first instead of the last port of call. He said most care should be delivered in the primary healthcare setting with a strong focus on prevention.

“A key principle of this Government’s policy is to treat everything at the lowest level of complexity that is safe, timely and efficient and as near to home as possible,” said Dr Reilly.

The minister was joined at the launch of a policy framework for a healthier Ireland in the Royal College of Physicians in Dublin by Children’s Minister Frances Fitzgerald and Ministers of State Roisín Shortall and Kathleen Lynch.

The Government is to draw up a policy framework for public health for 2012-2020 that will create the social conditions needed to ensure good health for all.

An initial draft strategy report is planned for the end of September, with a finalised report due by the end of the year.

Dr Reilly said two-thirds of illnesses were caused by risk factors that could and must be prevented.

Stressing that the Government would do things differently, Dr Reilly said there would be more input from other departments on the issue of illness prevention.

Ms Fitzgerald warned that much of the recent research on children’s health pointed to an appalling vista where future generations would be condemned to a life bogged down by ill health.

Minister of State for Primary Care Roisín Shortall said our attitude to alcohol had to change.

“We no longer accept that people have to die from cancer and heart disease, so how can we ignore the fact that so many young people are dying from alcohol,” she asked.

There were effective measures, including pricing and other regulatory mechanisms that could be taken to reduce alcohol consumption and supply.

“Our aim should be to delay the age at which a person starts to consume alcohol, as well as reducing overall levels of consumption by us all,” she said.

Minister of State for Older People Kathleen Lynch said normalisation of mental health was the way forward.

“When we get our primary care units in place, I will be insisting that mental health will be a part of that service,” she said.

She also stressed that people with disabilities lived in the same space as everyone else.

“Their difficulty is that we continue to ignore that,” she said.