The HSE has proposed a controversial plan that will see higher insurance premiums and increased waiting lists in public hospitals. It is understood that the HSE Plan on introducing a scheme where private patients will be billed for using public hospitals
Under the new proposal the HSE will charge those with health insurance the full price of a hospital bed even if they happen to spend their stay on a hospital trolley.
The move is likely to cause outrage among people who currently pay their health insurance premiums. The move will apparently send health insurance premiums to an all time high which will then result in thousands of policy holders being forced give up their cover.
It has also been claimed that the head of finance at the HSE instructed the country’s leading hospital’s to charge everyone with private health insurance if they arrive at their hospitals in an ambulance.
The consumer campaigning group One Big Switch has claimed that radical changes that the HSE are proposing will force numerous families out of the health insurance market.
According to One Big Switch Campaigns director Sarah Ryan who made the following statement: “The HSE is committed to charging patients with Private Health Insurance as much as possible. The end result of this will be that premiums continue to increase for households that are already bloated with costs. “This revelation only increases the need for consumer action before the costs rise once again.”
The organisation is currently campaigning to help get more affordable health insurance premiums for the pubic and to increase competition between current insurers here. The organisation is also aiming to get many of the 280,000 individuals and families who fore-fitted their health insurance over the past 6 years back into the market.
It is understood that the controversial proposal will put even more pressure on the health service as it is believed that those who cannot afford their health insurance premiums will be forced to turn to the HSE for treatment.