Speeches and Transcripts

AMA Transcript - AMA President, Dr Michael Gannon, 5AA, Medicare Rebate Freeze

Transcript:AMA President Dr Michael Gannon, 5AA, 31 March 2017

Subjects:Medicare rebate freeze

LEON BYNER: Now, one of the most important stories for you is that x-rays and scans could become cheaper - and this is in the May Budget which hasn't been brought down yet, but you know what it's like, they leak everything. However, the move could affect patients' access to after hours in-home medical care with cutbacks in this area. But the other thing is that, as you would know, the doctors have had their Medicare rebate frozen for some time, and this did cause quite a few issues, because we were getting people like yourself ringing in and saying I used to get bulk-billing; now I don't, I've got a much higher co-payment. So there's been some good news. Let's talk about it with Dr Michael Gannon, President of the Australian Medical Association. Michael, thanks for joining us.

MICHAEL GANNON: Good to be here. Good morning.

LEON BYNER: So what's this going to mean?

MICHAEL GANNON: Well, there's- we're not there yet, but what we're really hopeful that discussions with the Government will bear fruit and we will see an unravelling of the freeze. We're hopeful that there'll be an announcement in the Budget, but what we keep getting told is that the Budget's tight and the money's not there. But we're really hopeful that as soon as possible, the Government will realise that the numerous advantages that will accrue from undoing the freeze on what are actually the patients' rebates.

LEON BYNER: Well, there are two parts to this story. There's the doctors' clinical rebate when you go to the surgery, then there's the x-ray issue with scans. How important is that?

MICHAEL GANNON: Well, that's extremely important, and whether we're talking about prescriptions or whether we're talking about referrals for pathology testing or we're talking about referrals for diagnostic imaging, it's sometimes appropriate that there are out of pocket expenses. But what we don't want to see is the neediest people in the community deciding they can't afford to fill scripts or to have these tests done. Pathology tests, ultrasounds, x-ray, PT scans, they are part of the [indistinct] of clinicians, and we need those tests to help us make the decisions. So we don't want to be in a situation where people will defer having those crucial tests, often getting sicker, often ending up in hospital, and then sometimes you end up costing the health system a lot more.

LEON BYNER: So if we get what you're hoping for - and it seems that that's what we're getting, the news galleries that tell us information are saying that at the time when these freezes were announced, a lot of practices said look, we're going to have to stop or reduce bulk-billing. Would you expect the reverse to occur if that quarantine was lifted?

MICHAEL GANNON: Well, I don't think that you'll see a lot of doctors go back to bulk-billing, but certainly the number that's stopped doing it will arrest that trend. Let's not forget that this- there's multiple elements to the freeze. First of all, you've got currently 85 per cent of GP services bulk-billed. Well, that will just keep diminishing if this is frozen. About 30 to 50 per cent of specialist visits are also bulk-billed. Now if those doctors are under pressure, then they will walk away from bulk billing. It's also- the MBS schedule is basically how the private health insurers then calculate the fees they pay doctors. Now- but many of the for-profit insurers - because that's another thing that's happened at the same time, we've seen Medibank Private privatised during the freeze - what that's leading to is a lot of procedural doctors saying look, we can't afford to do this at the rate the insurers are paying us. They've frozen this for five years. So that's leading to increased out of pockets when it comes to private procedures. And then all of this together is leading some people to question the value of private medicine, put additional pressure on the public system. So you can see there are huge dimensions to the freeze. It's a lot more complex than just bulk-billing GP visits.

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31 March 2017

CONTACT: John Flannery                            02 6270 5477 / 0419 494 761

                     Maria Hawthorne                       02 6270 5478 / 0427 209 753

 

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