asked the Minister for Health if he proposes to introduce a scheme to assist asthma sufferers; and if he will consider assisting children under 16 by designating their condition as a long term illness to be defined on the basis of the drugs prescribed.
Written Answers. - Scheme for Asthma Sufferers.
13.
At present some 40 per cent of all asthmatics are covered by medical cards, and therefore, receive their prescribed drugs, as well as general practitioner services, entirely free of charge. Where an individual or a family is subjected to a significant level of ongoing expenditure on medical expenses due to a persistent medical condition, these expenses are reckoned in determining eligibility for medical card cover. In the case of a family, a medical card can be issued to one member of the family only, where appropriate.
The remaining 60 per cent of asthmatic patients comprise persons and their dependants, including asthmatics under 16 years of age, who have access to the refund of costs of drugs scheme. That scheme ensures that net unrefunded expenditure on prescribed drugs does not exceed £28 per calendar month. There is no income limit for this scheme.
The possibility of including asthma in the list of illnesses covered by the long term illness scheme has already been considered. However, present financial constraints do not permit this as such general extension of the scheme to those without medical cards would involve an increase of at least £10 million per annum in current expenditure on the scheme. The cost of extending the scheme to children under 16 years without medical cards would be some £3 million per annum. However, it would be virtually impossible to extend the scheme to young persons without extending it to all who have made a similar case.