Mary Butler (Waterford, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank all the Senators for coming in and, as they do every year, supporting this Bill. It is a technical but important Bill, and it has to be done.

A high proportion of the population holds health insurance, 47%, while the Government continues to maintain the community-rated private health insurance market. I highlight the fact that 1.6 million people have access to a medical card or a doctors-only card. Some 185,000 people have access to discretionary medical cards. In many cases, those people have illnesses but would not normally qualify for the medical card. We have made many improvements, including the addition of over 22,000 healthcare workers in the lifetime of this Government and an increase of 1,000 beds in hospital capacity in the past three years. The new public-only consultant contract is in place and more than 1,000 new and existing consultants have signed up to date. Public patient inpatient hospital charges have been abolished, investment in women's health has increased and State-funded IVF has been introduced.

Notwithstanding these improvements, I take on board the challenges and what Senator Gavan said about University Hospital Limerick. It is raised constantly and there are many challenges there, notwithstanding the new 96-bed block that is being constructed and a further one to come. We should not compare hospitals but I am in Waterford and University Hospital Waterford is the second busiest emergency department in the country and we work very well with community and step-down beds. We have a situation where we did not have anyone on a trolley in the last three years. That is by constant management and energy. The general manager is on the floor of the emergency department three times every day, seven days a week. There are learnings from other hospitals. I am not trying to compare one hospital to another because I do not know the intricacies and I know there are huge capacity demands in the Limerick area. I know this is high on the Minister's radar but I will raise it again.