Sir, – I read with some relief the letter from Dr Helen O’Neill (December 30th). It seems I am not alone in being left waiting several months to have my medical card to be renewed.
My application for a renewal has been with the relevant HSE office since September 6th, 2011. I am still waiting for it to be granted.
I am 29 years old, and I am currently on dialysis, awaiting a kidney transplant. I am single, have no assets, and earn the average industrial wage.
For the past six months, I have had to pay for my medication each month – this has been costing me €120, and due to the new threshold for the Drug Payment Scheme, it will cost be €132 from this month on.
I have not visited my GP in the past six months, because I cannot afford to pay for a visit. This has undoubtedly placed me at a higher degree of risk. Due to my chronic condition, I should have received the flu injection for the winter, but this was another protection I could not afford.
Having phoned the centralised medical card office in Finglas on several occasions, I have been told that nobody has looked at my application since it was received.
My situation has not changed since my first medical card was issued three years ago. Renewing my medical card should require little or no administrative effort.
The Irish Medical Organisation has expressed its concern that the HSE might be deliberately delaying the approval of medical card applications in order to save money.
I can only assume this is in fact the case.
Is this how it is going to be? Are sick people to be deprived of care to save the State some money? I joke with my friends that it was a combination of toxic banks and my illness that bankrupt this country.
The difference is they bailed out the banks. – Yours, etc,