It is difficult to have faith in the present health boards when one looks at the recent proposal to extend the medical card system to all those over 70. It turned out that the numbers proposed were substantially incorrect, with many of the beneficiaries already dead. To use a non-medical phrase, the boards' finger is no longer on the pulse. A bigger scandal is in the drugs payment scheme, which since 1997 has gone up by 221%. This figure is ludicrous. While I agree wholeheartedly with the principle of both schemes, in regard to medicines we must make sure there is value for money.