Colm Burke (Cork North Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister of State. The challenge that we now have is where the Minister of State has talked about the programme being put in place for over-75s. That is going to be a growing challenge because we have more people living longer. The Minister of State is right in that life expectancy in Ireland is one of the best across Europe. That is now going to present its own challenges. The number of people over 65 is going to increase from more than 805,000 up to more than 1 million within the next five to six years. There is going to be growing demand but we need to continue to innovate and deal with the issues - especially where people arrive into the hospital - making sure that they are assigned to the appropriate level of care. I know it is complicated and in a sense, if someone falls and breaks a leg or a hip then it is even more complicated. However, in a lot of cases, it is just a condition of healthcare that the GP or the nursing home cannot deal with and that is the one we need to work on, that is, how we can fast track them from the accident and emergency department into the appropriate setting in the hospital system.

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