The average out-of-pocket cost for West Australians unable to see a bulk-billing doctor has hit almost $41,eclipsing the national standard and the Medicare rebate.
Increasing the Medicare benefit is needed but only as one part of a wider package of reforms needed to revive our ailing system of primary health care.
Residents in Melbourne’s eastern suburbs are paying $47 in gap fees on average for each visit to the doctor,while some suburbs have no bulk billing options at all.
Most eastern suburbs and northern beaches residents are paying $50 on average or more for each doctor’s visit while there are virtually no bulk-billing GP clinics left in Newcastle.
Doctors and pharmacists have been at each other’s throats since they were separated into different professions in the Middle Ages.
Doctors’ groups say they will work with the government on recommendations to rein in billions of dollars leaking from Medicare each year.
A government report has found Medicare is bleeding money;losing billions of taxpayer dollars through billing mistakes,overservicing and outright fraud.
Billions of dollars are being rorted from Medicare each year,including by billing dead people and falsifying patient records to boost profits.
A major review into the universal healthcare system proves trying to preserve the status quo is no longer an option.
A government-commissioned report into Medicare found it is so poorly structured and loosely scrutinised that it is no longer fit for purpose.
Monique Ryan and other doctors say doubling the number of medicines a person can collect with each prescription would save patients and the government millions,but pharmacists vowed to oppose the reform.