Budgetary policy to improve health needs to shift from treatment to prevention

The Irish healthcare system, like many others, is designed to treat illness rather than prevent it, but the infrastructure and resources needed to support preventive care is often lacking

Patients wait for hours, sometimes days to be seen in emergency departments. File picture

As winter approaches, the inevitable heightened pressure on hospital beds unfolds before our eyes. 

Patients wait for hours, sometimes days to be seen in emergency departments. Elderly patients suffer the indignity of lying on trolleys waiting for beds that are non-existent, all the time risking more complicated admissions and sometimes tragic and avoidable deaths.