Social Democrats co-leader Róisín Shortall TD has said the Minister for Health needs to show political courage and urgency in implementing the Sláintecare health reform plan which was published a year ago today [30th May 2018].
Deputy Shortall chaired the cross-party Oireachtas Committee on the Future of Healthcare which produced the fully-costed ten-year Sláintecare blueprint for radical reform of Ireland’s broken health system.
Deputy Shortall said:
“Sláintecare is a product of unprecedented political co-operation in facing up to deep-rooted cultural and structural problems within our health service. It’s a ten year, fully-costed plan to provide the kind of modern and accessible health service which this country has lacked for so long.
“Sláintecare is about practical reforms to introduce much-needed accountability in our health system and tackle the dysfunctions which have contributed to the recent CervicalCheck scandal, the year-round trolley crisis and the ever-growing waiting lists.
“Minister Simon Harris has acknowledged that there is no alternative plan to Sláintecare. Yet he and the Taoiseach have shown a distinct lack of urgency in putting in place the building blocks to implement it. One year on from the publication of the roadmap, no one has yet been recruited to oversee its reforms.
Deputy Shortall added:
“I welcome today’s calls by the Health Reform Alliance and the Royal College of Physicians of Ireland for the government to get on with the reforms needed to build the patient-centred health system set out in the Sláintecare report.”
ENDS
29 May 2018