Social Democrats TD P\u00e1draig Rice has called on the Minister for Health to act swiftly on the recommendations of the Report on Dental Services in the Healthcare System, which is being launched by the Oireachtas Health Committee today.<\/p>\n
Deputy Rice, who is the party\u2019s health spokesperson and chair of the Health Committee, said:<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is now seven years since the National Oral Health Policy was published and we are still waiting for an implementation plan.<\/p>\n
\u201cSince 2019, the situation has only deteriorated. The medical card scheme is haemorrhaging dentists with the number of contracted dentists having halved in a decade.<\/p>\n
\u201cToo many children are leaving primary school without ever having had a dental screening. In 2023, fewer than 104,000 children were screened out of an eligible cohort of 208,000.<\/p>\n
\u201cMeanwhile, a continued failure to update dental legislation that is more than 40 years old is putting the public at risk. This is despite the fact that the Dental Council has been calling for a new Act since 2008 to overcome the serious limitations in the 1985 legislation.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhile alarms bells should be going off in the Department of Health, the fact of the matter is that public dental services have never been a priority for this or previous governments. Reform is always talked about, but never materialises.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis must urgently change. Public dental services have been outdated and impoverished for far too long.<\/p>\n
\u201cI am now calling on the minister to accept all 19 of the Health Committee\u2019s recommendations and act swiftly to implement them.\u201d<\/p>\n
April 16, 2026<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Social Democrats TD P\u00e1draig Rice has called on the Minister for Health to act swiftly on the recommendations of the Report on Dental Services in the Healthcare System, which is being launched by the Oireachtas Health Committee today. Deputy Rice, who is the party\u2019s health spokesperson and chair of the Health Committee, said: \u201cIt is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":16408,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[798,11,642,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17149","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-dental-services","category-health","category-padraig-rice","category-press-release"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n