Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The child was offered a long-term illness card but many of his conditions do not qualify under the long-term illness card. If somebody met the person they could sort it out. I use these cases to illustrate the problem. I dealt with approximately 12 cases two months ago, including people with varying ages and various conditions or disabilities, including motor neuron disease. Professor Hardiman of Beaumont Hospital said she had never written so many letters. Why? There has been a change in policy.

I cannot understand why the Taoiseach gets up here every day and says there has been no change in policy. Since the 1970 Health Act, undue hardship has been the reason in the legislative framework for giving people with particular conditions and illnesses medical cards. This represents only 0.3% of the entire medical card allocation. There has been a change in policy. The Taoiseach and the Minister for Health keep talking about narrowing the gap and financial thresholds. That is what it comes back to. For the last three years the move has been on to get rid of discretionary medical cards from the system, and it is dressed up in gobbledygook.

Only this morning my office was notified of another case-----

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