{"id":3445,"date":"2018-04-24T11:25:57","date_gmt":"2018-04-24T11:25:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/?p=3445"},"modified":"2018-04-24T11:25:57","modified_gmt":"2018-04-24T11:25:57","slug":"crowe-launches-pain-patch-postcard-appeal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/crowe-launches-pain-patch-postcard-appeal\/","title":{"rendered":"Crowe launches pain patch postcard appeal"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Dublin South West Sinn F\u00e9in TD, Se\u00e1n Crowe, has said that it is not too late for the Government, and the Minister for Health, to do what is clearly right for thousands of chronic pain sufferers, and lift his cruel restrictions on the pain relief patch Versatis. Crowe was speaking at the launch of a postcard campaign that calls for a reversal of this controversial decision.<\/p>\n<p>Deputy Se\u00e1n Crowe said:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>\u201cThe Minister for Health Simon Harris\u2019s arbitrary decision to restrict the prescribing of Versatis has added to the physical pain and mental distress of thousands of low income citizens, and their families, who relied on the patch to relieve their pain<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI am not sure if Minister has taken into account the additional costs associated with alternative medication, or increased hospitalization, the more demands on home help, home care hours and an increase in demand for anti-depressants, before he made this decision to limit access to this patch to those in pain.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHow can he, as Minister for Health, say that it\u2019s perfectly fine to prescribe Versatis for non-shingles related pain relief to those who can pay on the one hand, but then on the other hand claim the patch is not suitable for those on low-incomes, who are dependent on medical cards or the drugs payment scheme.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-3446 aligncenter\" src=\"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/ver-1-300x205.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"205\" srcset=\"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/ver-1-300x205.png 300w, http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/ver-1-768x524.png 768w, http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/ver-1-1024x698.png 1024w, http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/ver-1-1280x873.png 1280w, http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/ver-1.png 1340w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/p>\n<blockquote><p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI believe that at the stroke of a pen the Minister for Health can go back to the HSE and request them to carry out a holistic review around this cruel decision to restrict the use of Versatis. He can and should revert back to the position where those experiencing chronic and unbearable pain can avail of Versatis regardless of their family income. That is what this postcards appeal is about.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cEven after his cruel and ill thought out decision it is not too late for Minister Harris, and his Government, to do what is clearly right for thousands of chronic pain sufferers and lift these cruel restrictions on the pain relief patch, Versatis. I am appealing to people to support this postcard initiative and reverse this cut. \u201d<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-3447 aligncenter\" src=\"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/Ver-2-300x211.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"211\" srcset=\"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/Ver-2-300x211.png 300w, http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/Ver-2-768x540.png 768w, http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/Ver-2-1024x719.png 1024w, http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/Ver-2-1280x899.png 1280w, http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/Ver-2.png 1348w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>ENDS<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Dublin South West Sinn F\u00e9in TD, Se\u00e1n Crowe, has said that it is not too late for the Government, and the Minister for Health, to do what is clearly right for thousands of chronic pain sufferers, and lift his cruel restrictions on the pain relief patch Versatis. Crowe was speaking at the launch of a [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[44,367],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3445","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-health","category-versatis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3445","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3445"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3445\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3448,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3445\/revisions\/3448"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3445"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3445"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3445"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}