Mr. Ger Deering:

The Deputy referred to the treatment abroad scheme and the In Sickness and in Debt report. I am glad to say that is a good news story in terms of where have moved to and where we were previously. I will not go over the problems so much as the solutions we came up with and that have been implemented. Basically, we found that there was an overly bureaucratic implementation of the scheme. For example, where people got a letter from a doctor, perhaps signed by the secretary because the doctor was too busy, when they came to the end of the process, they found they could not obtain a refund of their money.

I wrote to Bernard Gloster, who came in as the new CEO of the HSE in March last year. I probably was one of the first to write to him. Certainly, I had the report on his desk within the first week of his appointment. We met him approximately two weeks later. I was very pleased with his response to our report, which was to accept all the recommendations. While there are 21 recommendations, two or three relate to the Department of Health. The vast majority relate to the HSE. I can say with certainty that the recommendations are not just being implemented. They are being implemented in the absolute spirit we wanted to see being employed. That is doing two things. First, some of the people who already had been denied refunds are now getting their refunds. I see the effect on the morale of the people in my office of being able to deliver that for those people. It is very important. Equally important is that our recommendations are being implemented now for the benefit of the people concerned. I meant what I said in my opening statement that we find now that the patient is at the centre of the process.

Going back to the Deputy's general point, everybody's first choice is to have treatment in the State. I have objected to the term "medical tourism", which I have heard used. Anybody who has had surgery knows it is not a nice place to be. The only place people want to go is home. Having to get on an aeroplane after undergoing surgery would be the worst possible thing. It is evident that people who go abroad for treatment are doing so either because they cannot get it here or cannot get it here in a timely fashion.

I ask the Deputy to contact us about the person he mentioned.