Sir, – News that the owners of the private Beacon Hospital are preparing to expand the facility at a cost of €75 million (Business, August 20th) is the clearest indication to date that despite the pledges to create a one-tier healthcare system made by the present Government, there is not the slightest intention of doing so. Just another case of the "Tell them what they want to hear" politics that continues unabashed and is largely responsible for the ongoing undermining of our democracy. – Yours, etc,
JIM O’SULLIVAN,
Rathedmond,
Sligo.
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Sir, – The proliferation of radio commercials advertising the accessibility of private health services, for those that can afford them, damns the idea that we are a republic.
More than 900,000 people are waiting for an elective service (“Record 908,000 patients on public hospital waiting lists”, News, August 20th). The very idea of operating such waiting lists should be a matter for public debate in itself. In reality Ireland doesn’t have an elective public system. We are a two-tier society and proud of it. The waiting lists serve one purpose – to frighten people into maintaining the two-tier society model through the payment of insurance premiums. When the need was unavoidable, we did operate a universal, free at the point of use health service, for the delivery of our vital vaccination programme. We can do it. We choose not to because we are as far from being a true republic as it is possible to get. – Yours, etc,
DECLAN DOYLE
Kilkenny.