Group seeks medical cards for all travellers

The travelling community has renewed calls for the Government to issue medical cards to all travellers until their standard of health is equal to that of the settled community.

The Pavee Point Centre, a support group for travellers, said the Government’s health strategy, due to be published today, acknowledges that health standards among the travelling community are well short of standards within the general population.

Speaking ahead of the official launch, Kathleen Joyce from the Pavee Point Centre said: "Not all travellers have a GP that will accept them with the medical card so what we were looking for was maybe that travellers could, until their health improves, be issued with a medical card regardless because their health statistics are so poor."