asked the Minister for Health if he will ensure that dispensary doctors, including doctors attending TB clinics, will issue certificates or letters to patients on request for the purpose of seeking priority on local authorities' housing lists because of their illness.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Housing Priority for TB Sufferers.
34.
Mr. O'Malley
The regulations governing the letting of local authority houses are primarily a matter for the Minister for Local Government. However, I can tell the Deputy that under the regulations, a housing authority is required to obtain, and have regard to, a report and recommendation from the chief medical officer for the purpose of determining priority for tenancies of local authority houses. For this purpose, the chief medical officer must acquaint himself with the family circumstances of applicants and must, in accordance with the regulations, give due weight to cases where one or more members of the family are suffering from tuberculosis. To oblige dispensary and other local authority doctors to issue certificates or letters to patients, as suggested, would add to their duties without serving any useful purpose, inasmuch as the chief medical officer is in a position to obtain from these doctors any relevant certificate he may require for this purpose.
If the Deputy has some specific difficulty in mind, I shall, if he will be so good as to furnish particulars to me, have the matter examined, in so far as I may have any function in the matter.
Would the Minister not appreciate and agree that considerable delay is caused where a patient, particularly a TB patient, who would get priority for a local authority house, is refused at the clinic a certificate to the effect that he is attending the clinic and is suffering from TB? Considerable delay is caused. He has to communicate with the local authority and with the doctor and wait for an answer Would it not short circuit the procedure and serve a very useful purpose if the certificates were issued on request?
Mr. O'Malley
The Deputy will appreciate that some applicants for houses bring along a certificate from their own doctor or dispensary doctor but it does not in any way speed up the possibility of granting them a house. The chief medical officer is well aware of the number of tubercular patients in the area over which he has jurisdiction and I am absolutely satisfied that the suggestion made by the Deputy would not speed up the process of giving these people a house. The Deputy will be further aware that under the Housing Bill which is almost law there are certain changes whereby the determining priorities are established. It says, for instance, that the housing authority shall obtain and have regard to a report from their chief medical officer. This would have to happen in every case. Finally, I should like to point out that in the case of a tubercular patient the doctor, for instance, in the sanatorium within the health authority area automatically informs the chief medical officer who has to be consulted by the city or county manager before a house is allocated. To sum up, I am satisfied, and I think the Deputy will be, that the position is quite satisfactory.
Will the Minister not agree that the chief medical officer in the city of Dublin cannot adjudicate as to whether a person should have priority or not because of an illness if the doctor at the clinic the person is attending will not furnish the information to the chief medical officer? These people cannot produce any evidence that they are suffering from TB.
Mr. O'Malley
I should like to point out that a district medical officer or dispensary doctor as we call them, is obliged to give, when required, a written certificate signed by him to the health authority as to the state of health of any patient attended by him and the duties of other local authority doctors are, in general, wide enough to enable such certificates to be obtained from them.
Could he not give it to the individual patient?
Mr. O'Malley
He is not required to furnish it to a patient. It is not part of his duties to give a patient a certificate. I can assure the Deputy, from personal experience, and I am sure he will bear me out, that it does not get a house for such individual any quicker to have a document from a dispensary doctor because, I can assure him again, the chief medical officer is quite conversant with the health of the person, particularly of tubercular patients. Also, the Deputy must be aware that when a person fills up an application form for a house, before the city or county manager will allocate a house, the health inspector must submit a report and, as we all know, health inspectors call and make a report in each case.
I can assure the Minister that the system he has in mind does not operate in the city of Dublin and unless a certificate from a medical gentleman is submitted to the housing authority, no priority will be given, irrespective of the illness the person may, in fact, be suffering from. These people cannot get such a certificate from the dispensary, particularly in Charles Street, for instance.
Is the Minister referring to ex-TB patients taking precedence over section 4 cases?
Mr. O'Malley
No; it depends on whether the tuberculosis is still active or whether he is under treatment.
But the recommendation of the CMO would take precedence over section 4 patients?
This is becoming a debate, not question and answer. Question No. 35.