#soapBox: An Open Letter To Minister For Health.

In Blog, Politicsby Fedayn9 Comments

Cian O'Daly and his son Henry.

Cian O’Daly and his son Henry.

Cian O’Daly emailed Health Minister Leo Varadkar with this plea for help. This was in response to learning just yesterday morning that, his son, Henry’s medical card application was refused.

“Dear Minister Varadkar,

My son, Henry Bolger O’Daly, was diagnosed pre-natally 5 years ago as having Hypo-Plastic Left Heart Syndrome. He was born with the entire left-hand side of his heart missing. He has endured a series of arduous and painful surgeries in order to make his remaining right-hand side of his heart viable until such time that he is a suitable candidate for full heart transplantation. This will happen when he is older, please God. His is an alternative circulatory system, resulting in diminished blood oxygen levels. As a result, he gets very tired and sometimes ill from pedestrian levels of activity. Obviously, his condition is a life-long, incurable and chronic congenital heart defect. In lesser words, my son will never get better.

We applied to retain Henry’s medical card and just this morning we found out that it has been REFUSED. I fail to see how he could not be granted a discretionary medical card, given the fact that his monthly medication expenses are exorbitant. We obtained a letter from his cardiologist, Dr. Orla Franklin (Crumlin), to support his medical card application. The content of this letter sets out in no uncertain terms the gravity of Henry’s condition and is explicit and detailed. This alone should set alarm bells ringing in the Health Service that this citizen, my son, Henry Bolger O’Daly absolutely should be granted a medical card.

In the short time that he has been alive, Henry has experienced a great deal of trauma which is now manifesting itself in his everyday life. He is a very anxious child and is currently attending a play therapist, the cost of which is not covered by the medical card. We cannot afford to pay the monthly DPS charge and pay for therapy.

Can you please give me a call? I am desperately seeking your guidance in the matter.

Regards Cian O’Daly”

Cian appealed for people to share this letter on his Facebook page yesterday.

Comments

  1. I’ve just emailed Minister Varadkar to let him know… I’ll be eagerly awaiting his reply! Can Rabble update us on how this goes…

  2. Wouldn’t it be somewhat corrupt for a minister to issue a medical card for every ‘bleeding hearts’ story?
    They should work on good policy not affective stories for the media.

  3. I wonder what kind of staff make these decisions. Ones that can’t read obviously. Probably just sitting there stamping “all” day long, knowing that people will make an appeal.

  4. So which side does Rabble fall on? Executive with one of Ireland’s largest and most influential legal firms should get a medical card for his child or deserving child gets medical card? Both cases apply here. Personally I wish all of us parents had medical cards for our kids but the state just can’t afford it. I really feel for this guy and his family, and I know I’m blessed that my children are healthy, but why when you see an opportunity to protest for no other reason than protest itself do you jump on the band wagon. We (as a nation) are broke, so surely on this matter the cards should go to the financially neediest first ? Maybe executives in McCann FitzGerald aren’t well paid? I’ve heard the argument against all kids under 6 getting a medical card – which is based on the families like this not getting one – and I really don’t get why rabble are flip flopping on this agenda. Fair play to this guy fighting for his family, I’d do the same myself. I’m not confused by his motives – I’m confused by your’s Rabble.

  5. Awful story that underlines the weakness of our health service. Just a shame that people in Ireland aren’t prepared to pay the taxes necessary to fund a decent health service. Rather than winding people up against Leo Varadkar, you might be encouraging a campaign for all of us to pay more tax. But then again, I guess it’s just easier to have a pop at a minister. Irish solutions to Irish problems hey?

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