Health perspectives

Australians express as much anger over the delivery and support of the country’s health system, but complaints are trivial when compared to the US. There are aspects in the Americanisation program form PM Howard could never change. The best he could do was to reduce hospital infrastructure funding.

Australians might be subjected to long waiting lists for hospital, or even emergency admission, but at least there is something to wait for, even for those who can’t afford health cover.

The arguments here, as a consequence, are quite different:

Health Cover

Since the 1970’s Australia has had basic health cover for every citizen. It isn’t perfect but the safety net is sort of there. There have been repeated attempts to cajole and force private cover, the problem there is that private clients still tend to pay over and above those under free cover.

Hospitals

There is a mix of public and privately run hospitals. They both suffer the same issues, a shortage of health care professionals and unwillingness to provide sufficient reward to staff. Hospital staff are increasingly treated like hospitality workers when it comes to wages and conditions.

In line with current business thinking the major investment is being put into equipment as though the whole system can simply be automated. There are constant horror stories coming out of outpatient and emergency departments, mainly because the personnel are not there to deal with patient numbers.

Early Intervention

Screening and early intervention have long been key issues here. Breast and prostate screening, the most common cancers here, and an effective program saves more than just grief but extends through to cut the enormous cost of potential hospital treatment.

Prostate screening is no as simply for blokes as getting a ‘little prick’, a small blood sample. Breast screening is problematic, with at risk women often unable to access an affordable service. Well they can get a rebate, but they still need the money to pay up front.

Pharmaceuticals

US negotiators have gone to great lengths to force Australia to abandon its subsidised pharmaceuticals program. John Howard was keen to accede to this demand, Australians weren’t.

The problem for Howard is that the subsidy program costs money, OUR money! The US negotiators were more concerned that the program effectively makes the Australian government the primary buyer of pharmaceuticals. With the subsidy issue in mind imports must be approved for price as well as the various efficacy issues.

The US tried to pull the pricing thing on India too. They said “fuck your intellectual property rights” and have developed a full parallel industry delivering affordable pharmaceuticals to their market.

I’m just skating across the top here, but the differences are comic, I’m sure. And we Australians are still not happy with out lot…