Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank Senators for their kind words of welcome and congratulation. As I said last week, I do not believe I am going to be able to pour sweet wine from the poisoned chalice.

I do not think for a second that I will be able to solve all the problems of the health service in the next 18 months just through the force of my personality but I hope with a good deal of help from others, and I will need a good deal of help, that I will be able to make things a little bit better over the next 18 months. I want to particularly focus on putting in place a realistic budget for next year, to which we can stick; making some real progress in providing universal primary care to our population, something to which I am very committed as a former GP; reducing the cost of medicines not only for the Government but for people when they go to their pharmacy, as the cost of medicines in Ireland remains very high; making careers attractive again in our health service, particularly, but not only, for doctors, on which Senator Crown touched; and also taking a personal lead on issues around health promotion and the prevention of disease.

I want to thank the Senators for tabling this motion today and my colleague, Senator Conway, in particular. The Government is committed to the provision of effective and responsive public services for people with visual impairment. It is also firmly committed to the prevention of blindness. We are addressing these objectives through overall population health actions and measures specifically targeted at eye health. The Government is committed to providing and developing vision services and supports through health prevention, screening, intervention policies and programmes, all of which contribute to achieving the priority goal of the World Health Organization's Vision 2020, namely, to eliminate avoidable blindness by then.

The core aim of the health service is to maximise the health status of people and to allow them to participate as fully as possible in the social and economic life of the community. The key elements in achieving this are the maintenance of eye health, the prevention of eye disease, early diagnosis of illness and availability of appropriate clinical interventions and supports.

In March 2013 the Government launched Healthy Ireland: A Framework for Improved Health and Wellbeing 2013-2025. This provides a framework for action to improve the health and well-being of our population over the coming generation, through a greater emphasis on prevention, early intervention and keeping individuals and communities well. The whole-of-Government and whole-of-society approach of Healthy Ireland recognises that often the risk factors for chronic diseases are outside the control of the health sector. Broader societal health determinants such as education, employment and the environment influence the distribution of such risk factors in our population-----