Medical Aids and Appliances
Seanad Éireann — 2026-07-14
============================================================

Shane Curley (FF), Cultural and Educational Panel

Gabhaim buíochas leis an Aire Stáit. I appreciate that. The issue we are trying to delve into is not the fact a HTA has not been carried out yet - we know the data does not exist in Ireland yet - but to get the timeline for carrying one out.
The Government has rightly placed renewed emphasis on improving diabetes care through the recently launched diabetes policy and services review. Commissioning the evidence needed to assess innovative technologies for people with type 2 diabetes would be entirely consistent with those objectives. If we are serious about delivering on that strategy, innovative technologies must be assessed using clinical evidence so that future policy decisions can be made with confidence.
This is also about ensuring health services keep up with innovation. As the number of people living with type 2 diabetes continues to grow, delaying a HTA will delay the gathering of the evidence needed to inform policy decisions. I hope the Minister will engage with HIQA and the HSE on scoping a rapid HTA for clearly defined cohorts of people with type 2 diabetes.
There are costs of not doing this. Let us look at the cost of the current situation versus what we could achieve and at the financial benefit to the State of investing in this in the short term to avoid longer term complications. I am not a medical expert but the cost implications of the health complications arising from not investing in CGMs and not having real-time data on blood sugar levels have been explained pretty clearly to me.

---

Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted.

Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-07-14/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-27T06:52:15+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-07-14