Call for clarity on health reform plans

THE Government’s plans for health service reforms and universal health insurance need far greater cost analysis and much clearer detail, the head of the largest doctor’s union said.

Irish Medical Organisation president Dr Ronan Boland said public expectations are being created about radical reform which has been inadequately thought through and which has not been costed to any meaningful extent.

“The concept of universal health insurance is a highly commendable one but its achievement will require a clear roadmap which has been altogether lacking to date. Only with more clarity can the general public truly make an informed decision on whether this reform is both achievable and affordable,” he said.

It emerged this week that the Government is to set up an implementation body to examine how to impose universal health insurance and what changes to the existing systems would be necessary. Fine Gael and Labour promised the measure which would guarantee all patients’ medical costs being covered, even those with no income, as a means of ending the public-private healthcare divide.

Dr Boland also called for more input into the debate from the next generation of doctors, more than 100 of whom he addressed at their conferrings at University College Cork yesterday, saying they and future patients have the biggest stake. But, he said, the Government should do more to keep doctors in Ireland to develop their early careers, when the country has more older people with a growing range of illnesses.

He told more than 400 graduates at UCC — who also included about 200 other nurses, dentists, therapists and other health professionals — they are qualifying in very similar circumstances to those faced by himself and others who graduated in 1987.

“Many of you will leave Ireland, at least in the short term, in pursuit of opportunities. The State is not doing enough to ensure that new graduates are given sufficient opportunity to forge a career in their chosen discipline in Ireland over the next five to 10 years,” he said.

His comments come in the same week that the group representing emergency medicine consultants warned of longer waiting times in emergency departments and potential avoidable harm to patients from next month when junior doctors’ contracts end. Initial findings from an Irish Association for Emergency Medicine survey show that many departments are struggling to maintain 24-hour cover and have had problems