Dr Trevor Mudge, AMA Vice President, with Leon Byner, Radio 5AA
BYNER: …enter a leaked document of the Federal Government. It tells us that the Government's going to increase the price of syringes to diabetics. Now, I find this absolutely extraordinary. We spend millions of dollars handing out syringes by the box load to drug users. We do this entirely at taxpayers' expense. We then have users who, through their civic duty, or stupefied state, leave these empty vessels of death lying on beaches or outside ovals or outside nightclubs. Councils and volunteers look after these where they can. Human Services even run a hotline to report abandoned syringes. But, despite what we do for drug users, and I'm not arguing with that at the moment, we cannot find it in our means to give syringes to diabetics. We want to charge them and up the ante. This is unbelievable! Why penalise a diabetic who, if they were a drug user, would not have to pay? It's not only penny pinching but it sends a dreadful message about fairness and equity to the Australian community. Diabetics do not break and enter to feed their habit. They aren't recreational needle users by choice; they are ordinary Australians trying to get on with their lives. The least we can do for them is to show support and compassion. To give syringes to drug users but not diabetics is discriminatory and shortsighted and it's just another silly step in the upside down world of health and politics we have in Australia. Do you agree with me or do you think I'm wrong? … Let's ask the Vice President of the AMA, Dr Trevor Mudge. Trevor, good morning. What do you think?
MUDGE: Well, I think there are lots of diverse incentives in society and the health system is not immune from those diverse agendas, is it, Leon?
BYNER: That's correct.
MUDGE: And I guess it's a terrible shame that politicians on both sides continue to play political football with the health of Australians. This sort of policy is really indicative of the Health Minister who's lost touch - who really doesn't, any more, connect with ordinary Australians. And if this is all this Health Minister's got, then it's time we had a change. It's time we had a bipartisan approach to improving ordinary health care for ordinary Australians. It's time that politicians started listening to the people and listening to the doctors who are trying to act in their interests.
BYNER: Trevor, just for the people of South Australia who don't understand the costs with regards to diabetics. What do diabetics have to pay for syringes at the moment?
MUDGE: I understand that the subsidised costs of syringes are $5. And many diabetics, of course, are having to inject themselves not once a day, but twice a day - even four times a day. Especially pregnant diabetics, I see, would use between four and six syringes a day. So, then, to go from $5 to $25 represents an enormous hit. I mean, across Australia, we're talking about finding $10 million in a health budget of $6 billion. I mean, you really wonder why they are targeting diabetics - it just seems crazy.
BYNER: So, we are looking now at an increase from $5 to $25?
MUDGE: That's my understanding of it, Leon.
BYNER: Fivefold?
MUDGE: Yes.
BYNER: That's outrageous!
MUDGE: Yes. It's an awful impost to people who are going to be struggling to care for themselves. I mean, we are trying to put out the message that diabetes is a long-term manageable condition that you can learn to live with and so you can lead a normal life - hard to lead a normal life that's going to cost you $100 a day for your syringes. And all to save $10 million in a health budget that's underfunded by about $3 billion.
BYNER: So what are you going to do with the AMA about this particular issue?
MUDGE: Well, we'll be making representations. The Health Minister doesn't talk to the AMA. So we'll be making representations to the Prime Minister's Office and to any other politicians that we can find.
BYNER: The Health Minister doesn't talk to the AMA?
MUDGE: No. The Health Minister doesn't talk to the AMA.
BYNER: Why?
MUDGE: Oh, basically because we're an independent organisation that he doesn't fund and therefore we tell him things he doesn't want to hear.
BYNER: So, are you telling me that Michael Wooldridge only listens to people he gives money to?
MUDGE: Yes.
BYNER: Well, I can't see how in a situation like that he could do the kind of job that he would want us to believe he's doing.
MUDGE: No, that's right. And, I think that's why this sort of policy is coming out of Government at the moment. Because, really, the Minister's Office has no way of listening to the people.
BYNER: So, what will you be doing? Are you going to try and do something about community support? Because, Trevor, I think it's about time that we got involved in these issues. I think that most reasonable South Australians would find this abhorrent that people who are diabetics could be paying from $5 to $25 a day for syringes. That's outrageous!
MUDGE: Yeah, well, it's the least of what's proposed in the Budget, as I understand it. Another proposition is that 65,000 Australians who are on cholesteroline drugs will have to pay more for them. That means that less people will take them and, so, in ten years' time, there'll be more cardiac disease as a consequence. Of course, this Health Minister won't be carrying the cost of the cardiac disease that occurs in ten or fifteen years' time. It's classic short-term gain politics. What we need in this country is a bipartisan approach to produce a health system that will actually get us into the 22nd century. We've got one at the moment that's just really, honestly, from the 19th.
BYNER: Well, you keep the pressure up, Trevor. That's Dr Trevor Mudge, Vice President from the AMA, with some very extraordinary comments this morning.
Ends