Consultants on public-only contracts allowed to do private work on own time, Varadkar says

Hospital consultants on public-only contracts are being allowed to do private work in their own time to stop a brain drain, Taoiseach Leo Varadkar has admitted.

More than 1,000 hospital consultants have signed up to the public-only contract, Mr Varadkar told the annual conference of the Private Hospitals Association, despite the contract having being rejected by the Irish Medical Organisation (IMO) and the Irish Hospital Consultants Association (IHCA).

The Taoiseach admitted that there were ideological objections within Government to allowing public-only consultants to do private work, but said he and Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly had taken a “very practical” approach to the matter.

“There was a risk that if there was a split that the private system would pare-off more and drive up costs and we would lose those people to the private sector,” he said.

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Mr Varadkar said the carrying out of private procedures in public hospitals is to be phased out. They currently they account for 16 per cent of all procedures carried out in public hospitals, a smaller figure, he suggested, than many people realise.

“I never liked in the health service having public and private patients in the same hospital, having consultants treat their public and private patients differently under the same roof,” he said.

“You’d never do this in school. There wouldn’t be a private class and a public class where the teacher spent more time with the private class. You just wouldn’t dream of it.”

He suggested that the Irish healthcare system is better than people give it credit for, but accepted it is not as good a model as the insurance-based systems in the likes of France, Germany and Belgium.

Many Irish doctors and nurses emigrate to Australia, but Mr Varadkar said people do not ask why Australia needs them in the first place. It is because the Australian health system can’t get people to work in cities like Perth, Cairns and Alice Springs.

He also stated that Ireland is bucking the trend internationally with waiting lists going down rather than up. Other countries, he added, had many of the same problems as Ireland with health consuming more and more financial resources while there are shortages of doctors and nurses everywhere.

The former interim chief medical officer, Dr Ronan Glynn, told the conference that it is rarely acknowledged how far Ireland has come in terms of healthcare. Average life expectancy in the State has increased by 18 months since 2010, mortality from heart disease and stroke are down by 38 per cent and 48 per cent, respectively, and mortality from respiratory illness is down by almost 40 per cent. All-cause mortality is down by 16 per cent.

A survey of 500 people carried out by EY, where Dr Glynn now works, found that while Ireland is showcasing world-class innovations in patient treatments and experience and hospital management, just 42 per cent are willing to engage with innovative healthcare solutions.

While 96 per cent of the public are aware of the use of artificial intelligence in diagnostics, just 36 per cent are willing to allow it to be used on themselves. Similarly, 94 per cent of people are aware of the use of robotics in surgery, but only 41 per cent would allow it to be used on themselves.