There are, in my view, two major debates about health care in Australia that are really worth focusing. Although there are a lot of things that could be said about health care in Australia most of it is the same old, same old without really exploring some of the underlying causes or causal links of these issues. Instead the health care debate in Australia is caught up in the wrangling between private and public health and the funding of health care into the future. I would prefer to focus on public subsidies for private health care and the state of Indigenous health care and life expectancy.
It’s also a timely response to the Rudd Labor Government’s promises during the 2007 federal election (the actual campaign that is not the 18 months proceeding the campaign).
1. Public subsidies for private health is something that I’ve blogged about on a number of occasions, and perhaps on those occasions not as articulately as I would’ve liked (although this is my blog for my ranting and raving). The situation we have in Australia, while still better than a lot of other democratic nations, is based on the principle of access to quality health care for all; hence the Medicare levy. Albeit for the past 12 years this principle has been muddied and distorted to support the various positions of the Coalition while it was power.
We now have a strange situation, well a situation that has been around for a while but not as solidly part of the landscape, of the taxes collected to support public health care is being diverted to prop up the private health care industry. This has of course led to a dwindling in the quality and level of services offered through the public health care system. (And it’s certainly not the fault of the dedicated women and men employed in the public health care system that there’s been such a gross diminution of services.)
What’s worse is the Medicare penalty, as distinct to the Medicare levy. The Medicare penalty as I call it, has been established to penalize people that choose to stay with the public health care industry. So if you earn over a particular amount of income you will be automatically slugged this penalty at tax return time. In essence your true choice is removed and replaced with a supposed choice of private health care providers and insurance agencies.
Then if you move to private health care you aren’t totally covered. There are any number of loop-holes in the contracts, things excluded and then if you do have to visit the hospital you have to pay for the excess; you know the stuff over and above the premium for which you paid a premium price. This hardly seems to be a quality service when you compare it to the public health care system despite it being under-funded. And once you made the move to private health care, because of the penalty, you face the reality of ever increasing premium costs.
It is the rising premium costs that are of most concern to private insurance holders. And the truth here is that they will always rise regardless of what politicians say about it. The argument about the need to include the Medicare penalty is so that the premiums of private health care are kept low but the sad fact is that every year the private health insurance companies cry poor. Once they cry poor there is the usual information deluge about the increasing costs of premiums and how they need to be given the option of increasing their premiums. So not only are taxpayers being penalized through the Medicare penalty, we are also forced to underwrite the rising private health insurance costs.
The private health insurance holders that bleat about how they’re tired of funding the public health system really need to read into the facts because it’s taxpayers underwriting and funding the private health care system. It really is annoying that my choice has been stolen and that my taxpayer funds for public health are diverted to prop up the private health care industry.
However, in general health care in Australia is pretty damn good but this isn’t the case of Indigenous Australians who continue to suffer massive gaps in health care and life expectancy.
2. Indigenous v non-Indigenous health and life expectancy gap is something that really needs to be made a much higher priority for our politicians at all levels. It is an appaling situation for Australia in this century to have a massive gap in the quality and access of health care for Indigenous Australians, the first people of this country. Not only that but Indigenous Australians celebrate when they live beyond the average life expectancy for an Indigenous person. It’s startly to know that an Aboriginal child born in 2008 will still, on average, live for 17 years less than a non-Aboriginal child.
Closing the Indigenous life expectancy gap is everyone’s business: it’s a national issue in which every individual, organisation and group in Australia can play a role. This is why a multi-pronged approach to tackling the Indigenous health crisis is absolutely essential; and it must include Aboriginal people from the very beginnings. This approach acknowledges the complexity and interconnectedness of health issues within Indigenous communities and doesn’t apply a one-size-fits-all model.
There is also the fact that many of the issues confronting non-Indigenous Australians in accessing quality and affordable health care are magnified for Indigenous Australians; especially those mob that live in remote regions of Australia. Very little funding is given towards relieving these kinds of health care issues, let alone having to deal with racist stereotypes in accessing care.
If you want a lot more information and ways in which you can help visit ANTaR
Ultimately, while the Rudd Government may claim to have done something about the cronic shortages in nursing staff and doctors, it is failing, in my opinion, to keep to its promises or even the underlying principled nature of the promises. There are no excuses or reasons for the public health care system to continue to be subservient to the private system when the latter provides such inadequate services while misappropriating public spaces for private patients. Australia may be ahead of other OECD nations in public health care but it may not be long before we slip to the bottom.
Tell me what you think! Vote in the Poll!
Filed under: Federal Election, Rants & Raves | Tagged: ALP, Australia, Australian Greens, Close the Gap, corporate welfare, election promises, federal government, health care, human rights, Indigenous, Indigenous Australians, Indigenous intervention, Julia Gillard, Kevin Rudd, Liberals, Malcolm Turnbull, Medicare, political donations, poll, private health care, public policy, social justice
