On 17th June Government announced the reinstatement of discretionary medical cards over
On that day, the public was told, according to the Department of Health, that the Health Service Executive will be able to undertake an “expeditious reinstatement” of the cards within a matter of weeks without changing the law.
On 25th June at a meeting between the HSE and TDs we were told that those entitled to a reinstated discretionary card would be contacted in the following 3 weeks.
On Thursday morning, the HSE went before a Dail committee and stated that 5,000 people still had to have their card reinstated. Laverne McGuinness, deputy head of the HSE, told the committee that it expects to have 10,000 discretionary cards that were removed between July 2011 and May this year restored by today and the remainder at the end of next week.
– See more at: http://www.independent.ie/
But on Thursday evening last , in an e-mail from the medical card section, I was told that it will take 3 weeks to have this resolved. (see below)
So who is fooling who?
From: Oireachtas PCRS <Oireachtas.PCRS@hse.ie>
To: Denis Naughten <denis.naughten@oireachtas.ie>
Date: 10/07/2014
Dear Deputy Naughten,
With reference to your representation on behalf of, (in regard to a discretionary medical card), I can advise you as follows:
The Government has made the decision that discretionary medical cards will be reinstated. The decision affects all those who had a medical card or GP visit card withdrawn following a review (and/or an appeal) between 1 July 2011 and 31 May 2014 i.e. since the centralisation of medical card processing.
The HSE will now commence the process of reinstating medical cards and GP visit cards to all those affected. It is estimated that this process will take 3 weeks. No action is required on the part of those affected; the HSE will be in contact with all those affected in the coming weeks.
I cannot confirm if your constituent will be included in this process at this time.
Kind Regards,
Customer Relations Unit PCRS
