Donnelly concerned over finding that Oliver Bond House residents have higher asthma rates

Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly has expressed concern after new research that found that residents of Oliver Bond House flats in Dublin are 2.4 times as likely to have asthma in their medical records as other patients attending the same general practice in their area.

Welcoming the report by Trinity College Dublin’s school of medicine Mr Donnelly said: “I think it’s important to see if it fits with the clinical advice we have and the public health advice we have that the physical surroundings matter in terms of healthcare and in terms of underlying conditions.”

He said the Government will be looking at the report and responding to it.

Mr Donnelly added: “We have to make sure that wherever people are be they in private accommodation or in public housing it shouldn’t matter.

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“We have to make sure that the physical environment is conducive to them being healthy and we would be very concerned about a situation where we’re seeing these significantly higher rates of asthma and other underlying conditions.”

[ Oliver Bond House residents more than twice as likely to have asthma ]

He was speaking ahead of a Cabinet meeting where he will put forward a number proposals on housing and pharmacists.

Income from the rent-a-room scheme will no longer be counted as relevant for people applying for a medical card or a GP card, under plans being brought to the meeting by Mr Donnelly.

He said the move is “particularly timely as over half the population for the first time have access to free GP care and this will mean that anyone can take in up to €14,000 to rent-a-room” without losing access to a medical or GP card.

Mr Donnelly said it is difficult to know how much rental accommodation the measure could add to the market but said: “Every single room that becomes available is very welcome.”

He said a second measure he is proposing is to allow pharmacists to sell certain medicines – including the contraceptive pill – without prescription.

Mr Donnelly said this would lift “some of the burden off GPs who are very, very busy.”

He said a new framework would be brought in to allow pharmacists to dispense medicines without a prescription.

This is to be “done in a very controlled way under regulation and under an expert advisory group.”

Another plan being brought to Cabinet is to put the Medicines Shortage Protocol on a statutory footing.

Mr Donnelly said this would mean that “whenever there is a shortage of [a medicine] that the pharmacist again, within guidelines and regulation can substitute that for their patient.”

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