Australia is drifting towards a two-tier system in health care. The paper A Health Policy for Australia: reclaiming universal health care explores how we can restore universalism and increase both equity and efficiency in health care – at no additional cost to the taxpayer.

CPD submission to the NHHRC

The Centre for Policy Research responded to the NHHRC’s call for submissions on its Draft Principles for Australia’s Health System and on its Terms of Reference, offering comments based on our own research and publications in the area of health policy reform. Click below to read the full submission to the NHHRC.

What’s Super about Labor’s new GP clinics?

Primary care is the care provided at the first point of contact between a consumer and a health care provider. Typically, this refers to health care that is accessed by consumers directly within their communities, such as general practice, pharmacy, physiotherapy and other allied health services. Primary care, which places an emphasis on the multi-disciplinary, preventative and well-managed care of a patient, may not result in as many newspaper headlines as hospital emergency departments but … more

‘A Health Policy for Australia’: response #4

A Health Policy For Australia is a welcome contribution to the debate about health reform which we desperately need to have. The problems facing our health system and our patients are well documented. [adsense:234x60:1:1] Advertisement A large part of the paper concerns funding mechanisms, insurance, and rationing. The approach to this issue appears to be a very ‘economic' one. The authors indicate that unlimited demand is a problem, and that moral hazard must be addressed … more

 

‘A Health Policy for Australia’: response #3

There are many aspects of A Health Policy for Australia: reclaiming universal health care that I could debate, but this would be missing the point. It is a brilliant paper that covers all the important matters with great skill. It is a great place from which to start the next revolution in health care. [adsense:234x60:1:1] Advertisement I particularly like the ideas about having a single health insurance scheme. Bob Evans, the justifiably well-known Canadian health … more

‘A Health Policy for Australia’: response #2

The authors of A Health Policy for Australia are to be congratulated in taking the bold step of developing a health improvement strategy for the health sector based on rational and appropriate policy perspectives and values – values which I for one am extremely comfortable with. If ever there was a sector of our Commonwealth that requires a fundamental re-think health is it. With that said, and whilst I am aware of the risk of … more

‘A Health Policy for Australia’: response #1

This initiative A Health Policy for Australia is most welcome. We desperately need debate in health. This note is intended to further that debate. While I would endorse much of what is being said, there are areas that I feel could do with more emphasis and elaboration and some that I think have been left out which I see as important.   Values and Transparency   [adsense:234x60:1:1] Advertisement Inequity and inefficiency need yet more emphasis … more

 

Clarification: what we really mean by universalism

In A Health Policy for Australia: reclaiming universal health care, we assert and demonstrate that public universal health insurance should be a central feature of our health system. With more rhetoric than logic, and apparently without having read the statement, Health Minister Tony Abbott reacted to our statement by extolling the value of private insurance (see Wednesday's Hansard). His case is threadbare. We need to arrest the trend to a two-tier system. We are paying … more

Health care reform: a journey of courage

This is an edited transcript of John Dwyer's address to the launch of A Health Policy for Australia: reclaiming universal health care in Sydney on Tuesday October 10. Thank you for giving me the honour of being here to launch a very important initiative. We've been promised health care reform for at least the last twenty years. I have on my desk a summary of a paper that was written in 1990, after a health … more

What health care system?

This is an edited transcript of Ian McAuley’s address to the launch of A Health Policy for Australia: reclaiming universal health care in Sydney on Tuesday October 10, 2006. We don’t have a health system in Australia — what we have is a mess of disparate elements, many of which function very well by themselves, but which don’t work together. This is largely the result of successive governments’ attempts to fiddle at the margins. Labor … more