THE GOVERNMENT’S plan to introduce universal health insurance is highly ambitious but may not be achievable within the proposed timeframe of six years, a conference on reform of the health service was told yesterday.
Dr Brian Turner, of the health economics group at the department of economics at University College Cork, said major doubts must hang over the possibility of the Fine Gael/Labour Coalition achieving its planned reform within its proposed timeframe. The Government, he said, was basing reform plans on the special delivery unit succeeding in reducing hospital waiting lists within a few years and introducing a free-at-point-of-use primary care system by the end of its five-year term in office.
The Government proposes to introduce a universal health insurance system for everyone early in the life of the next administration in 2016 and 2017, but the proposals are radical and may take longer to implement, he said.
“I think the stages are going to take a lot longer than they anticipate. The Dutch were chipping away at introducing universal health insurance for 20 years before they got to where they are today, and they were coming from a much more favourable position.
“I think the timescales here are very ambitious and the other big issue is the costings – the Minister for Health, Dr James Reilly, has said we can’t afford not to do this, but he hasn’t said how much it’s going to cost – and that’s a major question.”
Dr Turner said he had doubts about the possibility of the Government being able to fund the new system through achieving efficiencies. But there was much to be commended in the reform proposals, including the introduction of a standard insurance plan.
The proposal to place greater emphasis on primary care was also welcome, as it would allow people to access care at an earlier stage of their illnesses, he said. The universal health insurance proposals would lead to a single-tier health system, though it was open to the charge of not being progressive in the sense that someone earning €500,000 a year would pay the same premium as someone on €50,000 a year, he said.
Dutch expert Prof Wynand Van de Ven of Erasmus University in Rotterdam said his students were shocked to learn that in Ireland people with private insurance can jump the queue and also benefit from government subsidies when a free public health service exists.
