Dáil Éireann Debate, Thursday - 1 December 2016
22. Deputy John Brassil asked the Minister for Health if he has a target spend for primary care as a share of the health budget between now and 2021; the way in which Ireland’s expenditure on primary care compares to other OECD countries; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [38022/16]
View answerThe Programme for a Partnership Government commits to a decisive shift within the health service towards primary care in order to deliver better care close to home in communities across the country. The Programme emphasises the need and focus on enhancing primary health care services including the building up of GP capacity, increasing the number of therapists and other health professionals in primary care and continuing to expand the development of primary care facilities/centres.
Looking beyond 2017, I have consistently said that I strongly believe that the health service would benefit enormously from a single unifying vision that we can all get behind and that can help to drive reform and development of the system over the next 10 years. The Programme for a Partnership Government committed to the establishment of an Oireachtas All-Party committee to develop a long term vision for healthcare and direction of health policy over a 10 year period, with cross party support. The Committee on the Future of Healthcare was established in June this year and has set its objectives including to achieve cross-party consensus on a ten year vision for the health service with an emphasis on quality of patient care, supported by strong managerial and organisational accountability and also to develop a model of integrated healthcare with an emphasis on primary and community care.
Budget 2017 delivered the highest health budget ever at €14.6 billion. The level of health services to be provided within the available funding will be set out in the HSE’s 2017 National Service Plan, which is currently being finalised. Of the HSE 2016 budget for the Health Services, the proportion assigned to primary care in 2016 is 28% and I anticipate a comparable apportioning in 2017.
The OECD does not provide a cross-country analysis for spending on primary health care services, as the definition of primary care varies from country to country. However, Eurostat publishes relevant statistical information at European level. For the year 2014 it has published data for twenty-two of the EU 28 Member States- no such data is available from Denmark, Italy, Malta, the UK, Romania or Slovenia. From this data the best available approximation for total expenditure on primary care (private and public spending) can be created by combining expenditure on ambulatory health care providers and pharmacies. Based on this data, Ireland is ranked 8th of the 22 Member States for per capita expenditure on ambulatory health care and pharmacies, adjusted for Purchasing Power Standards.
