Mary Butler (Waterford, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Regrettably, this problem has become particularly acute during the past two years when the concentration of effort, both in the Department and the HSE, has been on the pandemic. That is not to say that officials have not been engaging with the dental profession. There has been engagement between HSE officials and the dental community throughout the pandemic on infection control measures and guidelines for safe dental practice, with a view to ensuring that a safe, satisfactory service could be continued for medical card holders.

However, the Minister acknowledges that there is an urgent need to address the fundamental issue of access to dental care. To achieve this objective, the Minister and officials wish to work in collaboration with the Irish Dental Association to address problems around access to services and to make the scheme more viable for contracting private dentists.

The €10 million the Minister has secured for this purpose represents an increase of nearly 20% on the existing budget. The Minister wants that funding invested as soon as possible, to make the scheme more attractive for practising dentists and thereby ensuring that a sufficient number of contractors will be prepared to continue to treat medical card patients. As I said, talks between the Department and the HSE with the Irish Dental Association are under way and there is hope a satisfactory conclusion can be reached by all concerns.

I will bring what the Deputy said back to the Minister because it is a very pressing issue and I agree with him on quarter 2. We need to push this rapidly.

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