Covid-19 patients will have to pay 23% more for antigen tests from Sunday as the Government is slapping VAT back on them.
People who are playing their part by keeping themselves away from already-stretched health services by testing themselves are being punished instead with major price hikes. This is despite the fact the country is experiencing another Covid spike with 737 cases reported in hospital with the virus yesterday morning and 35 very sick in ICU.
And it comes after the Chief Medical Officer Professor Breda Smith warned last week that the health service is creaking again and under its “most pressure ever” as it prepares for a winter surge of respiratory diseases, including Covid-19. Doctors are warning of a crisis too, including Dr Fergal Hickey, a senior emergency medicine consultant at Sligo General Hospital, who told RTE’s Drivetime that A&Es and GP offices are “completely and utterly gridlocked”.
