Don't let Howard Dismantle Medicare
by Takver Tuesday June 10, 2003 at 05:17 PM

The Howard Government has announced plans to change Medicare which will end universal health cover and lead to increasing health costs for patients.

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Don’t let howard reduce our world class health system to a two-class system: health care for the rich and second class treatment for the rest of us.

Australians pay for and benefit from one of the most cost effective public health systems in the world. Our Medicare cards enable us to access quality health care when we need it.

From richest to poorest, we all pay for this system through taxes and Medicare levies. Inclusiveness – universality – is the key to its success. But the Federal Government is mounting the biggest attack on Medicare and affordable health care since its introduction - they want to change Medicare to an American-style user pays system.

It’s up to us to Save Medicare.

How do we know?

Medicare was introduced in 1984. In a 1987 interview with radio 2UE, then Opposition Leader, John Howard, made his feelings clear

We will be proposing changes to Medicare which amount to its de facto dismantling ... we’ll pull it right apart.

The second thing we will do is get rid of the bulk billing system. It’s an absolute rort.

what are the threats to our health system?

Well, just for starters:

• health care rebates that differentiate between those with private health cover and those without. These handouts – TO INSURANCE COMPANIES - cost the public purse more than $2 billion a year
• stripping back public hospital funding. NSW, alone, will be underfunded by $875 million under the 3 year grant just announced by Canberra
• co-payments for doctor’s visits announced in this year’s budget. These transform bulk billing into a safety net for the poor and open up a future of rapidly increasing costs for doctor’s visits. This means one day soon some of us will have no access to health care at all.
• increasing the cost of visits to the doctor will mean that more people will be forced to go to emergency rooms to be treated. This will put further pressure on our public hospital system.

so how does medicare stack up?

The key health indicators below contrast Australia’s Medicare system with the privately driven US alternative (figures from OECD Health Data 2002). They show that we provide better health care at lower cost. However if Howard’s changes go through it will Americanise our system: increasing the cost without increasing the care.

AUSTRALIA Health Measure USA 72.4 % of total health costs paid by the Government 44.3 8.7 % of GDP spent on health 13 79 years Life expectancy at birth years 76.5 5.7* Infant mortality – deaths per 1000 7.1* 3.8 Available acute care beds per 1000 3
* 1999 OECD figures

Remember ...

Working Australians have paid for Medicare three times. In the mid-80s unions agreed to discount wages in return for a universal health system. These discounts, officially recognised by the Australian Industrial Relations Commission in 1986, are still reflected in today’s wage packets.

defend your medicare card
defend universal health care

Source: NSW Combined Pensioners and Superannuants Leaflet - PDF File

Medical Practictioner and public broadcaster, Joseph Toscano, on the death of Medicare

The Prime Minister's assurances that his government's proposed changes to Medicare are designed to protect bulk billing are reminiscent of his assurances to the Australian people that he had not made up his mind to commit Australian troops to the war in Iraq, after he had deployed 2000 Australian defence personnel to the Middle East. The Federal government's changes are designed to strip Medicare of its backbone universal bulk billing. The introduction of up-front patient co-payments for practices that agree to bulk bill pensioners and concession card holders, will result in rapidly escalating medical fees for the bulk of Australians and the beginning of a process that will create a two tier medical system in private practice.

Universal bulk billing ensures that all patients are treated equally, as the reward to the medical practitioner is the same irrespective of whether the patient is a concession cardholder or not. The introduction of a co-payment for non-concession card holders institutionalises the idea that Medicare provides two tiers of medical services, one for patients who can afford to pay for it and one for patients who cannot.

As a result of these proposed changes, many practices will discourage concession cardholders from attending or will provide a cursory service to them. Instead of defending and extending Medicare, a universal health care system that has served Australians well since its introduction in 1973, the Howard government has decided to destroy it. It's interesting to note that the AMA, an organisation that represents only about 50% of Australian doctors has thrown its support behind the Australian government's attempts to destroy Medicare. When Medibank was introduced by the Whitlam Labor government, the AMA was at the forefront of the battle to abort it, claiming it would end private practice in Australia.

Instead of retaining universal bulk billing by increasing Medicare payments to general practitioners (who have borne the brunt of successive government cut backs to Medicare), the Federal government continues to transfer around $2.5 billion of taxpayers funds every year to the private health insurance industry, an industry that only covers 50% of Australians.

Defending Medicare meetings around Melbourne include:

• Brunswick Meeting, Brunswick Town Hall, Thursday 7pm 12th June
• Darebin Meeting, Preston Town Hall, Friday 7pm 20th June

www.nma.org.au/

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