Dáil Éireann Debate, Wednesday - 18 January 2023
1230. Deputy Réada Cronin asked the Minister for Health Ireland’s position in the EU in terms of waiting list length and the numbers waiting for a specialist consultation as a proportion of the population; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [63489/22]
Amharc ar fhreagraI thank the Deputy for the question.
My Department has been collectively working on generating an evidence base for waiting list policy including benchmarking with other jurisdictions. While acute scheduled care waiting list data is readily available for our closest neighbours in Britain, and for the North, similar comparable waiting list data has proven challenging to access for other jurisdictions, including in the EU.
The EU Commission's statistical agency, Eurostat, which has responsibility for compiling EU-wide comparable official statistics, does not unfortunately collate data on waiting lists. Therefore, no official ranking of Ireland's position in the EU regarding waiting lists currently exists. However, some reasonable international comparisons have been made by the OECD, but for a very small selection of procedures and for a limited number of countries.
In February my Department intends to publish a number of Health Spending Review reports in conjunction with the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform. This will include a report entitled 'Acute Hospital Waiting Lists: International Comparisons and Waiting Lists in Ireland', which will be of interest to the Deputy.
There were 584,626 records listed on the active Outpatient waiting lists at the end of December 2022 (as published by the NTPF on 13th January), or c.11% of the population (based on published 2022 census data from the CSO). It should be clarified that this number is for waiting list records and not individual patients, as some patients are on multiple waiting lists simultaneously.
