Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Senator for her amendment and her contribution. The good news is this is the Bill that creates what we were calling the minor ailments scheme and are now calling common conditions, with those requirements to be set out in secondary legislation. As to the report on how this scheme might work, we will not need the amendment the Senator has tabled because this is the enabling legislation.

There are a few things happening. One is the expert group is finalising its work. It will be making recommendations which we will need to consider and implement whichever ones are accepted. In parallel, my Department is talking to the Irish Pharmacy Union about the practicalities of implementing this in community-based pharmacies. The IPU of course wants to negotiate this on behalf of its members. The Senator makes an excellent point, which probably is not widely known about medical card holders. It is pretty straightforward for people who do not have medical cards. At present if they go into a pharmacy because they have, say, conjunctivitis, which just requires simple eye drops, then even though the pharmacist knows it is conjunctivitis they cannot provide the medication because it is under prescription. Today the pharmacist would have to tell the person they cannot give it to them and that they will have to go to the doctor. The person might have to wait a week to see the doctor. I hope this is the case less and less, but in some parts of the country, a person might have to wait and pay €65. The doctor will give the person a piece of paper so he or she can go back to the pharmacist and be given what the pharmacist already knew the person needed. This will allow that to happen. This will allow the pharmacist to basically say he or she has the appropriate training, this is one of the conditions covered and provide the eye drops. It saves time, saves GP time and further enhances the role of pharmacy.

The Senator makes a really interesting point around medical card holders, because what is not commonly understood is even to get over-the-counter medication from a pharmacy, they have to go to the GP, whereas a non-medical card holder may just go in and just pay it. A medical card holder can do that as well, but if they do not want to pay, which they do not have to, then they must ask the GP to write them a note. It is not even a prescription because it is for a non-prescription medicine. They need to take up the GP's time and their own so they can go to the pharmacy for their over-the-counter medicine, which is being sold to person standing beside them for €15. Meanwhile, the medical card holder has had to incur all this healthcare cost and take up their own time and everybody else's time. The Senator makes a really important point about the benefits here. It is a benefit to the individual going in with a rash, conjunctivitis or whatever it is, but there are also going to be other benefits in time. It is not all covered under this, but it is about the policy direction and where we are moving. Medical card holders will not have to waste their time and the GP's time to get something from the pharmacist.

It has probably been a control mechanism in place to date. The pharmacists can play that role. They of course will want to negotiate a fee for playing that role and that is an ongoing discussion with the IPU. I thank the Senator. She has raised some really important points. I am satisfied what is called for here is in fact exactly what we are enabling through the Bill.