GPs won’t face penury any time soon

Dr William Behan (Letters, July 18) plucks something like a victim’s bow, as he catalogues the dwindling percentage returns for the ‘struggling’ GP operating the medical card system.

Perhaps he could augment his survey with a precise statement of overall net income from his medical ‘business’. That would enhance our grasp on the ‘crisis’, and maybe then we all could rally to the cause.

Given the figures that are regularly published re GPs’ medical-card incomes, one only has to surmise the additional private practice income to presume that, for most established GPs at least, there is little risk of impending penury.