Medical cards: ‘Denial of reality to say this was unforeseen’

AN "unintended consequence" was the phrase used repeatedly yesterday to explain why thousands of terminally ill patients or children with profound disabilities have been losing their discretionary medical cards at an accelerating pace over the past few years.

It was, we are told, completely unplanned, an accidental result and unforeseen outcome of a decision to centralise the medical card processing system into one single office for the whole country

And, once the Government realised what was happening, with horrific cases of seriously sick and vulnerable children appearing in this and other newspapers, it acted to stop it.