Kenny: I know of ill people who lost medical cards

Taoiseach Enda Kenny has revealed he personally knew of people with motor neurone disease who were unable to respond to the Government’s botched medical card review due to the severity of their condition.

Such people will be eligible to have cards restored, Mr Kenny told the Dáil as the scale of the review’s incompetence and harshness continued to emerge.

With 5,145 medical cards taken away because people did not reply to the HSE, Mr Kenny said such cases would be considered. “I know for instance of a couple of cases in which people with motor neurone disease were asked by the computer to respond. They were unable to speak and move and, therefore, could not respond,” he said.

“Those who couldn’t respond to the review will be taken into account,” Mr Kenny told TDs.

Despite people who had medical cards removed between July 2011-May, 2014, now having them returned, people refused cards in the same period will not get them, Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin told the Dáil.

Neither will people who have been recently diagnosed with similar conditions to those who had cards taken away, he added.

The Fianna Fáil leader branded the Government’s reversal of the medical card policy as being full of “inconsistencies and incoherence”.

“The Taoiseach mentioned motor neurone disease. How will somebody diagnosed with the condition in the next three or four months get a discretionary medical card?” Mr Martin asked.

The Fianna Fáil leader urged the Government to refund treatment costs to people who had their medical cards restored after the Carers Association estimated such bills could have amounted to €1,200 per family per month.

“Those people will get no refund even though the Government has accepted that it wrongly took the cards from them and has inflicted considerable costs on them.

“Thousands of people who since 2011 would have applied for discretionary medical cards, who have acute conditions and disabilities were governed by the same policy framework that governed the removal of the 30,000 cards,” Mr Martin said.

The Taoiseach responded by saying that many people with medical conditions received over payments from the State to help them with costs.

Mr Kenny added that emergency medical cards could be given to peoplediagnosed with serious conditions.

“The Government accepts...that it is completely unacceptable that families were put through the stress and strain that arose from the decision to centralise the assessment for medical cards,” Mr Kenny said.

The medical card U-turn was called a “smokescreen” by Sinn Féin health spokesman Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin.