Medical Cards

The reported delays, inefficiency and dysfunctional nature of the new centralised system for processing medical cards for the over 70s will be placed under the spotlight at tomorrow’s meeting (23rd) of the Oireachtas Committee on Health and Children. The meeting will take place in Committee Room 2 at 3pm.

The meeting was specifically called by the Committee owing to concerns expressed by members about delays experienced by their constituents since the service was centralised to Finglas, Dublin. The Committee is anxious that these problems are ironed out in advance of the planned centralisation in April of medical card applications for all groups.

Representatives from the HSE, Age Action Ireland and the Irish Medical Organisation will address the meeting.

Committee Chairman, Sean O’Fearghail TD said;
“There has been widespread dissatisfaction among Committee members regarding the centralisation of medical cards for over 70s. There have been cases of people in severe need facing long delays to get their cards, documentation getting lost and there have been constant difficulties in contacting the office.

This is not acceptable and these problems need to be sorted before the centralisation of applications for all groups can even be contemplated. We will be seeking assurances from the HSE at tomorrow’s meeting about what they have done to resolve this situation and what guarantees they can provide that similar incidents won’t occur when all services are centralised.”