Colm Burke (Cork North Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Deputy Padraig O'Sullivan and I. It is a committee on rare diseases. We went out there yesterday. We are manufacturing drugs for rare diseases in Ireland, but they are not available here. The issue may not be within the remit of this committee although it is about value for money. There are questions around whether we are getting value for money with respect to what we are paying for drugs and whether we are getting value when there is a delay in making particular drugs available, in the sense that we end up with people in hospital unnecessarily because there is a delay in accessing drugs. For instance, we are taking up to 700 days to get approval of some medication, whereas Denmark, which has the same population as Ireland, is approving new medications within 247 days. It does not make sense that we are the fourth biggest exporter of pharmaceuticals in the word, yet a whole lot of stuff manufactured here is not getting approval.

I wonder whether it is worth looking at it from the point of view of the two items: first, are we getting a fair deal in what we are currently using; and second, is there a better mechanism for making sure we can get value for money and, at the same time, getting new products made available in a timely manner for patients here? I know it is complicated.