Fianna Fáil will build an affordable and accessible health service for all

Fianna Fáil has outlined how it will implement major investment and reform in our health service to make it affordable and accessible for all.

In Government, Fianna Fáil allocated an additional 40% funding, from €18.4bn in 2020 to €25.8bn in 2025, to our public health service, delivering record increases in staffing and hospital beds, reducing costs to all patients and expanding access to existing and new services.

Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly and Lorraine Clifford-Lee today confirmed that Fianna Fáil’s Affordability and Accessibility focused Health policy will build on this reform over the past four years by delivering shorter waiting times, reducing costs and expanding the care and services available to patients.

Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly said: “Our guiding principle in Fianna Fáil is to make sure everyone can get the healthcare they need when they need it. That is why we insisted on taking responsibility for Health in 2020.

“If you need a doctor, nurse or therapist, if you need a simple procedure or a complex operation or if you need home care or a nursing home, it can’t matter how much money you have, where you live or what age you are.

“If returned to Government, Fianna Fáil will ensure full national coverage for GP on call, increase the number of Consultants in Emergency Medicine by a further 50%, ensure patients have more access to diagnostics after hours, invest further in Emergency Departments to reduce overcrowding and open an additional 12 Injury Units to provide patients with an alternative to Emergency Departments.

“We will also further reduce waiting times, targeting all patients to be seen within 10-12 weeks, utilise new funding and contracts to deliver more surgeries and care at weekends, further progress the work to remove routine private care from public hospitals and allow health professionals to make direct referrals to specialist services or tests.

“There have been four strong years of investment and reform under Fianna Fáil in Government. We want to build on this and make healthcare for everyone a reality.”

Lorraine Clifford-Lee said: “We believe healthcare should be affordable and accessible for all.

“That is why we will extend free GP Care to all children aged 12 and under, reduce the Drug Payment Scheme monthly maximum payment from €80 to €40 over the next five years, aree a new Dental Treatment Service Scheme for medical card holders and cap all remaining hospital car parking charges that exceed €10 per day.

“People should be able to access as much care as possible in their home and in their community. We will design a statutory homecare scheme to enable people who want to stay in their own home to do so for as long as possible, open another 100 enhanced primary care centres and continue to expand our community care teams.

“We are asking people to back our vision of everyone in Ireland getting the care they need when they need it and to back Fianna Fáil.”

-ENDS-