asked the Minister for Health the amount of tranquillisers sold in each of the last ten years.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Sale of Tranquillisers.
13.
I regret that this information is not available for the population as a whole and it would be a very difficult, if not impossible, task to obtain such information. Statistics are, however, available in my Department on issues of these preparations to medical card patients under the new general medical service. In the six months following the extension of the new scheme to the whole country on 1st October, 1972, the total number of prescriptions for tranquillisers was 275,399. The proportion of the population covered by medical cards at 30th April, 1973, was 31.3 per cent.
Would the quantity sold to non-medical card holders be the same as that in the case of medical card holders? Is there any way of checking with the manufacturers?
I do not think it would be possible to get that information.