Irish Examiner View: Contrast in eye op wait obscene

The Association of Optometrists Ireland point out that people living in the North West can expect cataract surgery with a year of diagnosis but that their cousins in the South West may have to wait up to five years. 

Anyone with even a vague commitment to social equality - far more of us than cynics might suggest - is aware of how very uneven access to health services remains. 

Those of us who rely on public services need a deep well of forbearance for some basic necessities. 

This reality is recognised by 2.2m - 45% 0f the population - of us who pay what might be termed a super tax for private health insurance. 

Insurance companies, whose premiums regularly increase at a rate well above inflation,  offer many benefits but their most persuasive one is that someone with private insurance need not fret about undue delays. 

Pay up and dodge the queue is the pay-off. If you are, as some commercially-alert medical professionals term it, VHI Positive all treatment is available as it is needed. 

Those without cover live in a different world. 

The Association of Optometrists Ireland has highlighted one shameful disparity. They point out that people living in the North West can expect cataract surgery with a year of diagnosis but that their cousins in the South West may have to wait up to five years. 

As our population ages more and more of us will need cataracts removed - now a simple enough, one-day procedure. 

This is a fundamental quality-of-life issue and unless addressed early ushers in a premature loss of independence.

It is obscene that in a country as rich as this that anyone should be asked to wait five years for this basic treatment. 

Why are our politicians, why are we not so outraged by this failure, this inequity that it remains unresolved?