Publication: The Australian
Date: 7 August 2010
Section: Opinion
Article excerpt:
THE amount Australians pay directly for health care -- from their own pockets -- is rising rapidly and is a health hazard.
The Australian Bureau of Statistics found that last year a little more than one million Australians aged 15 years or more delayed seeing or didn't see a general practitioner in the previous year due to cost. People under 45 were more likely to have reported cost as a barrier to seeing a GP than people 45 years and older.
The report adds that almost one in 10 people 15 years and older who'd been prescribed medication the previous year delayed filling or didn't fill their prescription due to cost. People without private health insurance were about twice as likely to see cost as a barrier to getting their medication than people with private health insurance.
... Stealthily, inexorably, Australian health care has become more expensive for the patient. This has occurred as the amount the patients must pay for medicines, for example, has risen dramatically.
Out-of-pocket cost isn't restricted to medicines, it also applies to consultations. The amount patients pay is a supplement, or co-payment, to whatever Medicare, private health insurance and the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme provide.
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