Sir, - It is high time the Government introduced a comprehensive free GP service for all. The present system of private GP care has not changed since the foundation of the State. The structures are exactly as they were in 1922. The Department of Health has virtually no input and no interest in the delivery of GP services to those who do not have a medical card - approximately 2,500,000 people.
If a German or a Frenchman on holidays in Dublin or Cork goes to a GP he does not have to pay. He gets his prescription free at the chemists. But 2.5 million Irish people have to pay both GP and chemist.
When a stroke patient comes home from hospital, if he has the medical card he gets everything free - walking-aids, nursing-care, special banisters, bathroom fixtures. But the 2.5 million excluded people have to pay every inch of the way. This is inequitable and unjust, especially at a time of personal and family anxiety.
A man living in Northern Ireland is entitled to totally free comprehensive GP care. His neighbour across the border in the Republic must pay doctor and chemist.
The Government should design and implement a compulsory GP insurance system. This could be mediated through VHI, BUPA, or through another insurance agency, with premiums for low-income people paid by the Government.
We have free hospital-consultant service, free primary, secondary and third-level education. The GP system is the only broad area of social endeavour which remains as it was when poultices were the treatment for pneumonia. - Yours, etc., Dr Cyril Daly,
Howth Road, Killester, Dublin 5.