It’s time for new thinking

Waiting lists

Any parent told that their sick child must wait three years for a food allergy test at the country’s longest-established paediatric allergy centre would be right to be outraged. So too would any parent told that a sick child must wait a year for a first appointment with an allergy specialist. Any society that tolerates this failure needs to reconsider its commitment to basic human values and how it manages its public affairs.

That this situation exists in a country of barely more than 4.5m people where the annual health budget is €14.1bn seems bizarre and plain wrong. That the five centres dealing with these issues are “overwhelmed” and that 28,600 children have all three major allergic conditions — asthma, eczema or a food allergy — just adds to the feeling of failure.

Health Minster Leo Varadkar has asked for another €1.5bn and virtually every organisation representing health providers or patients has warned that the service is teetering on the verge of collapse. A significant increase in funding is unlikely in the short term at least, so better management seems to be the only resolution to this failure.

This issue, and so many other seemingly intractable difficulties, demand a resolution that has eluded administrators, medical staff, and politicians for far too long. Even at a moment when resources are described as inadequate, a new kind of courage and imagination are called for to bring unacceptable three-year delays to an end.