Health is typically a big spend area in federal budgets. Last night's is getting mixed reviews, with one lobby group describing it as a "missed opportunity". But there are also positives. The cost of medicines listed on the pharmaceutical benefits scheme will be frozen for a year, offering some reprieve to the growing cost of living.
Category
📺
TVTranscript
00:00 Typically, what we see is that on the 1st of January each year, the cost of medicines
00:07 rise. What this is going to do is freeze in for the next 12 months, the cost of medicines
00:13 available through the pharmaceutical benefit scheme. So essentially the most somebody will
00:17 pay for a medicine on the PBS is $31.60 per script. Now, for those who hold a concession
00:24 card and have a pension, for example, on a pension, that will actually be capped at $7.70.
00:32 And specifically for those people, it will also mean that that is locked in that $7.70
00:38 for five years. So that is going to be quite a considerable saving for people who really
00:44 do find it difficult to make ends meet, especially when it comes to covering the cost of medicines.
00:50 This is part of a deal that's been struck with the Pharmacy Guild. People might remember
00:55 that late last year, there was a bit of a fisticuffs between the Pharmacy Guild and
01:01 the government as they were coming to terms with different agreements. And this is all,
01:05 you know, this is something that the Pharmacy Guild is extremely happy with. And they estimate
01:11 that it could save people in the realm of around $300 million over the next four years.
01:18 The government has set aside $227 million. That's over the next four years. Now, this
01:24 is to fund further urgent care clinics. This will contribute to 29 new clinics. And that
01:30 will take nationally, that will mean that we'll have 87 of these urgent care clinics.
01:37 These clinics are specifically designed to cater for people who have urgent needs, but
01:43 may not be quite as critical in what they require that they may need to say, to go to
01:49 hospital. So it's meant to take pressure off the hospital network. One of the criticisms
01:55 that we do hear over time is from those in the medical workforce. They say, you know,
02:01 that they're very concerned that these big hubs that these centres will take away some
02:06 of the GPs who are already working in an overstretched system. And they're very concerned that this
02:12 will not do anything to ease the work pressures that we're starting to see throughout that
02:17 general practice and primary care network. So that's sort of where we where we do see
02:22 different lobby groups start to raise concerns. It's typically because they're very worried
02:27 that they just won't have the staff to fill these centres. One of the main areas of concern
02:32 that we're really starting to hear about is about mental health. Mental health at the
02:38 moment in Australia is an area of huge need. And what we're seeing is that there is certainly
02:45 hundreds of millions of dollars set aside over the next say, eight years for dedicated
02:50 mental health supports, but there are serious concerns that this just will not be enough.
02:56 Now around $588 million over eight years will be dedicated to a new digital mental health
03:03 service that will cater to people who have perhaps some of the lower end needs. There'll
03:08 also be around $71 million to support existing clinical services for people with moderate
03:13 mental health needs. And then there'll be around about $29 million set aside. Now this
03:18 will be to add more value and I guess to help to strengthen wraparound services for people
03:26 who require some more complex care, who are at that more severe state of mental health
03:32 needs. However, given the state of mental health care at the moment, and again, an absolute
03:38 lack of workforce in this area, what we're hearing is that there is a lot of concern
03:42 with different medical groups, that there is not enough measures in this budget to,
03:47 I guess, help to promote the mental health workforce and that that's really an area that
03:53 they need to see more investment in. They say that they just aren't enough staff and
03:57 there's a lot of concern about that lack of funding for medical workers, especially in
04:04 this mental health space. So definitely a lot to look at. There's definitely positives
04:08 in this budget for health care, but there's also areas that different medical groups would
04:13 like to see further investment and further work in.
04:16 [BLANK_AUDIO]