‘No public beds for private patients’

Private hospitals can alleviate the huge pressure on public hospitals by taking their private patients.

The transfer of patients with private health insurance is a key consideration in the Oireachtas Committee on the Future of Healthcare’s blueprint for the health service over the next decade. The blueprint is to be published shortly.

With 650,000 people on waiting lists for hospital services, the committee is looking for ways to free up public beds. The chair of the committee, Roisin Shorthall, confirmed that the transfer of patients to private facilities was being examined.