One to two general practitioners (GPs) and five fully staffed hospital beds are required for every 1,000 new homes built in the Republic, according to research by the Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI).
This means that taoiseach-designate Simon Harris’s pledge to build 250,000 homes over the next five years would necessitate an additional 375 GPs and 1,250 extra hospital beds.
The ratios come courtesy of a new modelling tool developed by the ESRI to ensure that new housing is “matched with sufficient healthcare services”.
The research, funded by the Department of Housing, comes in the wake of Mr Harris’s promise that a Fine Gael-led government would build 250,000 houses over the next five years, a figure that exceeds the Coalition’s existing targets.
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Mr Harris identified housing as a key priority in his leader’s speech at the party’s ardfheis in Galway last week, suggesting there was a recognition within the Government that the current output targets “need to be revised”.
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The ESRI’s Housing and Healthcare Planning (HHP) tool estimates that an additional 1,000 homes would coincide with annual demand for almost 11,000 general practitioner (GP) visits. This demand would require 1.5 GP whole-time equivalents (WTEs) to provide that care, the ESRI said.
The calculation is based on a typical “Housing for All” development, comprising 30 per cent supported renters, 20 per cent private renters and 50 per cent homeowners.
The 1,000 homes would also see annual demand for 300 acute public hospital inpatient admissions, which equates to almost five fully staffed inpatient beds.
The ESRI’s research noted that demographics differ across tenure type.
For predominantly social housing projects, the GP demand is found to be greater. “This is largely due to higher GP demand among supported renters who, despite having a relatively young age profile, tend to have higher rates of chronic illness and higher rates of medical card and GP visit card coverage, and thus greater demand for GP care,” the ESRI said.
Demand for acute public hospital inpatient care is, however, slightly lower in public housing developments as inpatient care demand correlates strongly with age and supported renters have a younger age profile than homeowners, it added.
In a private housing development, comprising 90 per cent private renters or homeowners, GP demand is, however, marginally lower.
“Housing and healthcare are critical issues for policymakers and the general public,” the ESRI’s Brendan Walsh said. “Co-ordinated planning to ensure that housing developments are matched with sufficient healthcare services, creating sustainable communities with secure housing and dependable healthcare is vital.
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“The development of the HHP model represents the first attempt to quantify the impacts of building new housing developments on local healthcare services in Ireland. While this model presents results on primary care and public hospital care, future outputs using the HHP model will examine a range of other health and social care services.”
He said results from the HHP model would provide an evidence-base “upon which to base planning for localised healthcare supply and infrastructure”.
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