Marie Sherlock (Dublin Central, Labour)
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1399. To ask the Minister for Health the cost to the State to fully subsidise the cost of all prescribed inhaled asthma medications and related devices. [29495/25]

Jennifer Carroll MacNeill (Dún Laoghaire, Fine Gael)
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It is difficult to provide a robust estimate of the cost to fully subsidise the cost of all prescribed asthma medications and related devices. The additional costs to provide reimbursement for patients currently receiving supports under the General Medical Services (GMS) Scheme or the Drugs Payment Scheme (DPS) would derive from the loss of GMS prescription charges and the loss of monthly contributions (currently €80 per family) under the DPS.

A patient’s diagnosis is not collected on prescriptions and therefore is not submitted to the HSE Primary Care Reimbursement Service (PCRS) as part of the reimbursement data submitted by pharmacy contractors, so data is not readily available to carry out a robust analysis to support an estimate.

The HSE PCRS has grossly estimated that the additional costs noted above might be of the order of €40m. This estimate purely relates to the ingredient, dispensing fees and patient contributions linked to reimbursement for those currently eligible under the GMS and the DPS.

However, additional costs would arise to reimburse the private costs for patients who do not have medical cards and whose monthly costs fall below the DPS threshold of €80. The HSE does not have visibility on this data as it is private prescription data and is not currently submitted to the HSE.

The HSE National Clinical Programme (COPD & Asthma) has stated that Asthma is the most common chronic respiratory disease in Ireland, with approximately 1 in 10 of the population being asthmatic. The Asthma Society of Ireland estimates that approximately 450,000 people in Ireland currently have asthma. They also estimate that between 3% and 10% of this population will develop severe asthma. Additionally, the Society estimates that around 900,000 people in Ireland are expected to develop asthma during their lifetime. This data would suggest that there could be significant sub-threshold costs which the HSE does not have sight of to enable a robust cost estimate to be made.