Children ‘to get medical cards back’

Sick children who lost medical cards in a recent HSE cull are to have them reinstated within weeks, according to parents who met yesterday with the health minister.

The parents, who launched the Our Children’s Health national campaign last month, were given the undertaking by Minister James Reilly at a meeting attended by the country’s most senior health officials, including Department of Health secretary general Dr Ambrose McLoughlin and HSE chief Tony O’Brien.

After weeks of intense lobbying, the parents said Mr Reilly made a “fulsome apology” for the “hurt and distress” the removal of discretionary medical cards had caused to so many.

The group said in addition to a commitment already given to reinstate immediately any medical card under review or appeal, that any card falling due for renewal will automatically be renewed, pending the introduction of a new framework which an expert panel is currently working on.

Regarding discretionary cards previously withdrawn where no appeal was in process or undertaken, the group said the minister had committed to identify and reinstate medical cards for all those affected within a number of weeks, “by the summer at the latest” and “with the minimum of upset or interference”.

In addition, the campaign group said:

- The HSE had undertaken to “flex” the system as much as possible to accommodate new medical card applicants. The group said details are awaited.

- The HSE did not rule out considering conditions for medical card eligibility that did not make the core list of conditions drawn up by the expert group.

However the campaign group said it remained concerned the expert group was focusing on establishing a list of medical conditions in order of priority.

“It is essential that the characteristics and implications of a condition are taken into account in addition to a core list of illnesses and we will be making a full submission in that regard,” the parents said.

Separately, Mr O’Brien told RTÉ yesterday that parents who insisted they were asked if their child still had Down syndrome when applying to keep medical cards had misunderstood the question.

“There have been many instances put into the public domain recently that are not true characterisations of the facts,” Mr O’Brien said.

* Our Children’s Health campaign is in Cork’s Daunt Square today from 10.30am.