Madam, – In the HEALTHplus supplement (July 28th) I noted that a Cork city developer had succeeded in changing a planning permission for an apartment block for that of a 100-bed five-storey private hospital costing €60 million. Since then, I have become aware that this announcement is the latest of a spate of planning permissions recently granted for private hospitals in Cork city, including the Bon Secour’s €85 million 80- bed expansion, the €245 million 100-bed co-located hospital on the grounds of the University College Hospital and the conversion of an existing building into yet another private hospital.
Private health construction seems to be the only form of construction active in Ireland at the moment, with private clinics and hospitals popping up all round the country. But do we really need these very luxurious health services and do Irish people want this segregated form of health care?
In the present economic downturn, can we afford the very generous tax breaks granted by our Government for these private constructions? We must remember that private health care is primarily for profit and will inevitably have to be paid for through private health insurance or by those who pay directly for their health care. Currently in Ireland we have a dwindling population of no more than 2.3 million people with private health insurance. The VHI, the principal insurer, has recently reported a steady decline in its membership, with 70,000 customers having dropped out since the beginning of 2009, and an increasing number unable to afford any form of health insurance.
Just as President Obama is preparing to reform the American health service, we in Ireland seem to be rapidly moving towards the US current model of health care, a model that leaves 46 million middle-class people unable to afford health insurance and is reported to be the most frequent cause of domestic bankruptcy. When it comes to the private health industry in Ireland we seem to be still living in a developer-led State.
Without government regulation we are going to end up with a massive oversupply of hospital beds which we cannot afford and which will inevitably end up as more bad debt which the Irish taxpayer will be expected to shoulder. There is, I believe, an urgent need for Government control of the private health industry. – Yours, etc,