Irish Examiner view: Dearth of age-attuned healthcare
The Irish Longitudinal Study on Ageing's latest report highlights gaps in heart disease care, falls and fracture care, osteoporosis treatment, chronic pain, as well as mental health services. Stock picture
The stark challenges of our ageing population were outlined in detail on Tuesday in the by Niamh Griffin. She outlined the implications of a report which has revealed frightening gaps in health services available to older Irish citizens.
The report, the latest of its kind from Tilda (The Irish Longitudinal Study on Ageing) highlights gaps in heart disease care, falls and fracture care, osteoporosis treatment, chronic pain, as well as mental health services.
In addition, the HSE has admitted conditions such as high cholesterol are at “critical unmet need” level, with some of those conditions combining with other illnesses to the further detriment of sufferers: Of those surveyed, for instance, 36% had undiagnosed hypertension, while among those with that condition, 47% had blood pressure measurements above safe levels.
While the shortcoming of our health service have been clear to all for some time, there is something particularly concerning about these revelations and what they portend for the future. The profile of the country’s population is ageing fast, with projections suggesting the number of older people in Ireland is set to double over the next 25 years.
That means there will be a growing need for specialist medical care focusing on age-related illnesses and conditions such as those mentioned above — therefore it is worrying when HSE chief clinical officer Colm Henry says services are not ready for older patients, or not “age-attuned”, as he put it. The sliver lining here is Dr Henry’s follow-up point, when he said the undiagnosed illnesses mentioned are not inevitable aspects of ageing but are “challenges we can address with the right health and social care systems in place.”
This is surely the key lesson here — that while the extent of undiagnosed illnesses in older people is shocking, we can move as a society to address these challenges. We can surely focus on the quality of care being provided for the older cohort of our population, and ensure that care will become more “age-attuned”.
The deaths in Gaza show no sign of stopping anytime soon, with recent reports suggesting that starvation and rocket attacks alike are claiming Palestinian lives in the war zone. Israel continues to kill with impunity, though its reputation as a civilised country has surely been fatally compromised on the international stage.
Its cultural standing has certainly been questioned in recent days. Just this week, the Spanish culture minister Ernest Urtasun mulled over the possibility that his country might pull out of the Eurovision Song Contest 2026 if Israel is not expelled from the competition. Speaking on Spanish television, Urtasun said: “If that doesn’t happen, measures will have to be taken.”
Spain is not the only country pondering abstention. The Slovenian broadcaster RTV SLO has also said it will only participate in Eurovision next year if Israel is banned in the same way as Russia, which has not been invited to participate since invading Ukraine in 2022.
This is not the final word on the matter. Germany, a powerful presence in European broadcasting, is in favour of Israel participating in the song contest, as are the likes of Italy, Switzerland, Austria, Greece, Azerbaijan, and Cyprus.
The possibility of a boycott raises some obvious questions: At what point does a contest to win a European title cease to be representative of Europe? If more countries were to join Spain and Slovenia in such a boycott, then the credibility of the contest — the Euro part — would surely be undermined.
Which brings us to the next obvious question: Will Ireland boycott the Eurovision Song Contest, having been to the fore in opposing Israel’s barbarism in Gaza? When the matter was being discussed last May, RTÉ director-general Kevin Bakhurst said RTÉ — which organises Ireland’s participation in the contest — was not considering pulling out of the event, adding that he did not want to put pressure on the Israeli public service broadcaster (which organises Israel’s entry).
While this is understandable, the point of a boycott is surely to use pressure to achieve specific ends. If Ireland is serious about supporting those in Gaza, then it is hard to see why discomfiting an Israeli broadcaster should be out of bounds. The lesson that actions have consequences is one worth sharing.
Apple launched new products on Tuesdsay, with a slimmer iPhone grabbing headlines at the launch in the company’s headquarters in Cupertino, California.
The staggering success of the iPhone means this is significant news globally. That success has led some to describe Apple as a phone company which makes computers rather than the other way round, and the iPhone’s ubiquity means that a significantly different model — this one is the thinnest model yet — will be the subject of much discussion.
So is the company’s general health.
Apple is awaiting certainty from US president Donald Trump on his tariff plans, as those may have an impact on its productivity and profitability.
In that context, a recent visit by Apple CEO Tim Cook to Trump’s White House may be significant, and in particular his willingness to say “thank you” to the US president eight times in two minutes.
Given Apple’s presence in Ireland, and Cork in particular, the new iPhone and Mr Cook’s obeisance to Donald Trump are both topics of considerable interest here. New developments will be closely followed.
