Mick Barry (Cork North Central, Anti-Austerity Alliance) | Oireachtas source

The Minister read from a prepared script and did not answer the questions. Did the Minister know about these secret waiting lists? If he did not, why not? How much of the delay in access to treatment for public patients is due to private patients being taken ahead of them? Is it the case that if one cannot pay one suffers, even if one is a child and that if one can pay one can go ahead even if one has less medical need? How can any health service and Minister for Health stand over that? Given that, is it not time for a well resourced, single tier health service in this country? Does the Minister not believe that the time has come for an Irish national health service?

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