Book Offer
This will close in 10 seconds
Independent TD, Carol Nolan, has criticised remarks made by Health Minister Jennifer Carroll MacNeill during a Dáil exchange with her last Wednesday, saying the Minister’s comments have “deepened the crisis of confidence” between frontline dentists and the Department of Health.
Deputy Nolan said in the Dáil that she wanted “to raise serious concerns again about the dental system and the total collapse of dental services for medical card patients and the lack of timely assessments for school going children.”
“I and others have noted that this has really regressed. In the 1980s, as schoolchildren, we all had those timely assessments but we seem to be going backwards. It is getting no better. Even PRSI patients have had a number of benefits that they would have got in the past eliminated,” she said.
Responding, Health Minister, Jennifer Carroll MacNeill, said: “The fee paid to dentists for medical card patients has been increased by 40% and yet people still do not want to do it. I do have to acknowledge that as part of their conference dentists had two days, one on dentistry and one on aesthetics.”
“I challenged the Irish Dental Association on that and it robustly defended the ability of dentists to do Botox and other things as part of their choice of how they practise. I have to highlight all these different things. Yes, we need to have a new contract anyway. Yes, we need to continue to make sure that we have a structured programme particularly for children. However, it is also true that there is not just dentistry happening and that is reducing capacity particularly in the public system.”
This will close in 10 seconds