Liam Twomey (Wexford, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I wish to share time with Deputy Peter Fitzpatrick, three minutes and five minutes.

The health service is made up of different groups of vested interests. Many of the aspirations of these groups conflict with one another, which leads to major challenges for those who are trying to manage our health services. On top of that, the recent health Ireland survey, published by the Minister, Deputy Varadkar, shows the problems we continue to store up for our health services.

We still have significant problems with drug and alcohol abuse, obesity, high blood pressure and diabetes. We need to focus on decreasing the health and financial impact of these diseases. They are problems about which we can do something, and we need to redouble our efforts to sort them out because they are storing up major costs for individuals, families and our health service. It is something that will overwhelm our health service.

Many people come into the Chamber and talk about the NHS as if it was a panacea for all of our problems. In fact, it is not. It is in crisis for a number of different reasons. It is not able to look after patients. One will wait up to seven days in the NHS to see a GP, which is not a GP service compared to this country, where 96% of patients can see their GP within 24 hours of contacting a surgery.

Many things are working extremely well in our health services. We have an occasional crisis because that is the way of health services. They are not like a bus timetable or train schedule; there are peaks and troughs which frequently create problems.

There are issues within our population that we cannot control, such as growing old - we cannot stop that. We need to look after this cohort of patients, but they are not all the same. Many of my patients in their 80s or 90s are as healthy as can be. They live and drive independently and have active and very fulfilled lives. Another cohort within that population are fully dependent, and need full nursing home care and major resources in the community to help them. They are completely different from the other group.

All of the conflicting interests within the patient population, and doctors, consultants, nurses and administration and physiotherapy staff, all have their ideas about how things can be done right. It is time we had a national conversation about what we will do about our health service. The solutions are not always what we can import from abroad. Many of the solutions are already in place and many parts of our health service are working very well. We need to analyse where the problems are and start sorting them out.

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