Dáil Éireann Debate, Thursday - 8 September 2022
1907. Deputy Paul Donnelly asked the Minister for Health if web doctors will be excluded from prescribing contraception in the delivery of the proposed new scheme to make contraception freely available to women aged between 17 and 25 years. [43602/22]
Amharc ar fhreagraThe Programme for Government, 2020 commits to providing free contraception for women, starting with the 17-25 age cohort. My Department has been working with partners, including the HSE, towards ensuring that the scheme will commence in September, 2022. Funding of approximately €9m has been allocated for this in Budget 2022.
The scheme will be open to all 17-25 year-old women ordinarily resident in Ireland and will provide for:
- The cost of prescription contraception;
- The cost of consultations with medical professionals to discuss suitable contraception for individual patients and to enable prescription of same. Consultations will include both initial discussions of suitable contraception for each patient, and necessary check-ups to provide repeat prescriptions;
- The cost of fitting and/or removal of various types of long-acting reversible contraception (LARCs) plus any necessary checks, by medical professionals certified to fit/remove same;
- The cost of providing the wide range of contraceptive options currently available to GMS (medical) card holders, which will also be available through this scheme, including contraceptive injections, implants, IUS and IUDs (coils), the contraceptive patch and ring, and various forms of oral contraceptive pill, including emergency contraception.
- The cost of training and certifying additional medical professionals to fit and remove LARCs;
The legal framework for the scheme is provided by the Health (Miscellaneous Provisions) (No. 2) Act, 2022, which was enacted in July, 2022. It is envisaged that the Act will be commenced, and the scheme launched, once the Regulations setting the terms and conditions relating to the provision of services and fees, etc., are expected to be enacted later this week. It is envisaged that the scheme will go live next week (the week commencing 12 September 2022).
The Department of Health and the HSE are working with service providers in term of preparations for scheme commencement. It is typically the case that formal agreement with the main medical and pharmacy representative organisations is reached regarding the detail of service provision, prior to engagement with other smaller providers.
I can confirm that officials in the Department have contacted smaller specialist service providers, with a view to discussing possible engagement with the scheme and to discuss any issues they may wish to raise.
With specific regard to telemedicine, it will be necessary to have the provision of prescription contraception in this manner reviewed by clinical experts, prior to inclusion in the scheme. Advice from the relevant clinical experts has been sought in this regard. If the clinical advice is that it is appropriate in terms of patient safety, etc., for prescriptions for oral contraceptives to be issued through online consultations under a State sponsored scheme (i.e. without the ability to carry out physical checks using calibrated equipment, etc.), amendments will be required to the Regulations that will lay out the terms and conditions of scheme participation for providers, following negotiations with providers to agree these.
Completing these requirements may take a little additional time; therefore it may not be possible to include such providers in the scheme from the outset. However, their inclusion is being actively worked on and we are hoping to include these options as soon as the appropriate clinical and regulatory processes have been completed.
The design of citizen engagement information and publicity campaigns to support and promote the roll out of the scheme is currently being finalised by officials in the Department’s Press and Communications Team, the HSE’s Communications team and relevant subject matter experts in the Department and HSE Sexual Health and Crisis Pregnancy Programme.
The campaign will target 17-25 year olds with a broader reach to all adults through an extensive media engagement and outreach programme on broadcast and video on demand services; digital out of home advertising in a variety of locations including third level institutes, retail settings etc; targeted and an organic social media campaign. Digital information regarding the scheme and how to access it will be available through www.sexualwellbeing.ie shortly and contraceptive choices materials will be placed in GP surgeries from later in September.
