asked the Minister for Health whether the recently published claim that Irish people consume 100 million pain killing tablets a year is true; how this compares with other countries; and if he will make a statement on the matter.

The vast majority of popular, pain-relieving proprietary branded drugs are available "over the counter" in pharmacies, family grocers, supermarkets, etc. A prescription is not required for purchase. My Department have no information on the sales volume of these product lines.

The information available relates only to those pain relieving drugs which are obtained under the GMS scheme, which covers some 37 per cent of the population. Nearly all of these drugs require a prescription for purchase. The latest available figures relate to the calendar year 1983. Some 61,876,000 pain killing tablets and capsules were dispensed under the GMS scheme in that year. I am sure that Deputies will find this figure quite extraordinary.

There is a general agreement that an unnecessary degree of psychological reliance on drugs has developed here over the last 20 years or so, reflecting similar trends in other European countries.

The Minister is assuring the House that we are no different from other countries in the fondness we have developed for pain killing drugs.

We are as bad as other European countries and worse than the Americans. That is bad enough. We swallow them by the ton.

Does the Minister consider that it might be desirable to take some steps to control this? I do not know if that is possible. Would he consider that there may be grounds for controlling it because of the easy availability of these drugs over the counter, in supermarkets etc? Judging by the level of consumption under the GMS scheme consumption by the entire population must be in excess of 100 million.

A great many of the drugs are entirely useless. People spend a great deal of money and many pharmaceutical companies make a great deal of money. The drugs do not do the slightest good one way or the other.