Paul Lawless: Ireland's Dental Care Crisis Exposed
Paul Lawless sets out failures in Ireland's public dental service, warning families and children are being left without access to dentists. He outlines problems in the school screening programme, bottlenecks in the Dental Act, and shortages in the dental workforce.
Paul Lawless describes growing reports from families who cannot find a dentist, including patients with medical cards. He says the government’s school screening promise - that every child should see a dentist before leaving primary school - is not being met for the vast majority of pupils.
Lawless points to structural barriers in the Dental Act, including rules that prevent a patient seeing a dental hygienist without a dentist referral. He argues those rules create avoidable delays and leave thousands of children and adults without basic preventative care.
Citing parliamentary data, he highlights that 40% of students studying dentistry in Ireland come from outside the EU and that the country is roughly 500 dentists short, according to the Dental Association of Ireland. He says current admissions and workplace planning are mismanaged and that more places must be protected for domestic students.
Lawless calls for urgent reform: revise the Dental Act to remove bottlenecks, improve workforce planning, expand training places and protect places for Irish students to ensure the public dental service can meet demand and prevent long-term harm.
Access problems
Paul Lawless describes growing reports from families who cannot find a dentist, including patients with medical cards. He says the government’s school screening promise - that every child should see a dentist before leaving primary school - is not being met for the vast majority of pupils.
System bottlenecks
Lawless points to structural barriers in the Dental Act, including rules that prevent a patient seeing a dental hygienist without a dentist referral. He argues those rules create avoidable delays and leave thousands of children and adults without basic preventative care.
Workforce and training concerns
Citing parliamentary data, he highlights that 40% of students studying dentistry in Ireland come from outside the EU and that the country is roughly 500 dentists short, according to the Dental Association of Ireland. He says current admissions and workplace planning are mismanaged and that more places must be protected for domestic students.
Policy implications
Lawless calls for urgent reform: revise the Dental Act to remove bottlenecks, improve workforce planning, expand training places and protect places for Irish students to ensure the public dental service can meet demand and prevent long-term harm.
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Transcript
Families are contacting me now on a regular basis in relation to dental care and the level of frustration and desperation is really shocking and the truth is that so many parts of the country now people cannot access their dentist and there are parts of the country where if you have a medical card you won't find a dentist. That is how bad the dental service scheme is and in relation to the school screening program every child according to this government is entitled to see a dentist before they leave primary school but the vast majority will never see a dentist under that program and will never get their teeth examined and that system is in such chaos the system has such bottlenecks that thousands of students continue and will continue to leave the school system without ever seeing a dentist and that is that is absolutely wrong there are so many families in Ireland that simply cannot afford to go private and these children are suffering and the suffering will go on into adulthood because these are these are no longer baby teeth Minister and that is the truth of it. I believe we need to look at the Dental Act at present there are bottlenecks in the system for example a dental hygienist cannot be seen until a dentist refers a patient on to the public system and the fact that you can't access a dentist means that therefore you cannot access a dental hygienist that is a bottleneck that needs to be addressed and Minister and in relation to like workplace planning is really important and this government is not planning for the future when it comes to dental care like many other services in this country I submitted a parliamentary question to the Minister for Further Education and the data was really quite alarming 40% of students studying dentistry in Ireland are from outside the EU that is extraordinary we are we are training so few dentists in the country and the and 40% are actually outside the EU the remaining 60% is a combination of Irish students British students and EU students so this government is not even capturing that data Minister this is really important we need to understand how many Irish system how many Irish students are in the system and like at a time when dental care is in crisis at a time when the Dental Association of Ireland are outlining that we are currently about 500 dentists short the solution and the answer to this problem the government give a significant amount of places of limited places to students outside the EU the vast majority of whom will not be retained in the Irish system and this crisis is going to go on and on and on and I've listened to deputies right around the house outlining how long and how many years into this crisis we are this a crisis Minister is temporary and this now is a complete and utter gross mismanagement of the system we need to address the workplace planning in the system we need to ensure that we expand the places and we protect those places for our students as well