The Government have confirmed that the HSE will require yet another bailout this year after the state health agency had a massive overspend of €324 million.
The coalition say the health board will require a bailout of over half a billion euro, the news comes after the latest figures from the Exchequer show the health service massively overspent in the first nine months of this year. The news will most likely not be welcomed by the Irish taxpayer as it is the ninth time in the past ten years the agency had to be bailed out.
However the Minister for Public Expenditure Brendan Howlin has defended the bailout saying the issue is ‘understandable’ and that every developed country has major difficulties controlling its health budget, Mr Howlin said: “It’s changing. Health inflation is much higher than normal inflation. New services and products are coming on strin. “Thankfully we are living longer. Mr Howlin added: “It’s going to be an ongoing challenge for every developed country to adequately resource and provide a decent health care system.”