Madam, - I returned from Denmark several years ago, having worked there for 15 years. When I came home I found the Irish medical system (for want of a better word) so appalling as to be approaching Bolivian standards.
I stress that I am attacking the system, not the staff. The staff, in my eyes are heroines and heroes all. They are at the front and down in the trenches with very little back-up, and certainly no medals presented for a job gallantly done.
Denmark is half the size of Ireland, with much the same population. It experienced no "Celtic Tiger" effect, yet everyone has a medical card. My Danish doctor, knowing the Irish system, advised me to have a check-up before I returned. I saw three specialists and had a very thorough heart and blood test within three weeks. By the way, the Danes have one of the highest standards of dental health in the world.
Normally I wouldn't waste ink, but the obscene statement made by a politician, quoted in your newspaper, to the effect that the pathetic (and sometimes tragically fatal) trolleys in our hospitals are "state-of-the-art" was just too much to ignore. It is apparent that a sick head of cattle, no matter how remote the location, has more immediate access to expert medical help than some human beings. Then again cattle have a monetary value - unlike my niece, who had to give birth on the side of the road while trying to reach the maternity unit in Limerick, as none existed in Ennis or Clare. There were no complications, thank God, but what about the mothers and babies who have experienced complications?
There was a sick joke going the rounds here before I had to emigrate to the effect that most people in Ireland thought that the Mayo Clinic was in Castlebar. Do I hear giggles amid the click of champagne glasses in the K Club and the VIP lounges at the races? - Yours, etc,
CHRISTY MURPHY, Main Street, Miltown Malbay, Co Clare.