Reading Trevor’s post on psuedoephedrine based medicine below, has spurred me to write this.
It brought home to me the senselessness of making it harder and more expensive to get basic health care. Who will suffer the most? People on low incomes and marginalised parts of society.
The overall effectiveness, fairness and cost of our health system hinges to a large extent on accessible and high quality primary-care services.
They’re not my words. But they are a view that Labour strongly agrees with. And gee it’s not rocket science (I seem to use that phrase a bit). If you prevent people from getting sick, or rather help them to stay healthy, then they need less health services in the long term which ultimately costs the country less. Derrrhhh!
The quoted phrase above comes from Professor Peter Crampton, Dean of the University of Otago (based in Wellington) and Dr Santos Jatrana, Research Fellow, Dept of Public Health at Otago Uni.
In an article published in the October 2009 University of Otago magazine, they argue that a strong primary health care system that is cheap or free results in a healthier society.
Labour understood this and in 2007 brought the costs of visiting the GP down considerably. From an average of $50 to $25 or less and some services provided free of charge. We also reduced prescription charges from a maximum of $15 per item to $3 by July 2007.
We had work to do in dental care, and I’m committed to pushing that along. Labour, under Ruth Dyson as health spokesperson, is absolutely committed to a strong, robust primary health care strategy that is about making our system more accessible at the front end and preventing as much illness as possible.
Crampton and Jatrana’s work found that in 2005 there were significant financial barriers for a substantial group of New Zealanders in accessing primary care. They are currently analysing data to from 2007 to see if the situation improved following the introduction in 2006/07 of more generous government subsidies for GP visits and prescriptions.
I’ll bet they’ll find there have been improvements, but I wonder how long they’ll last. I don’t see any signs of this government being committed to a strong primary care strategy. I don’t think this government gets it.
PS: I can’t link to the article yet as it’s not online
The Primary Healthcare Strategy was well before 2007 Clare – there were PHOs across the whole country well before the 2005 election.
Healthcare should be, and needs to be, freely available to everyone.
This government is committed to higher profits and privatised healthcare. That’s all the understand.
What about the threat to our healthcare posed by the proposed Free trade agreement with the US? Why is noone questioning Key on this? They want to get rid of Pharmac and flood us with expensive US pharmaceuticals..Currently Pharmac uses a lot of generics etc to keep the cost down..We buy from England , Germany , India etc..In future, will all these products have to come from the US? Local scientists will tell you that some of the best products come from Germany.
“They want to get rid of Pharmac and flood us with expensive US pharmaceuticals..Currently Pharmac uses a lot of generics etc to keep the cost down.”
I hope not, that’s scary.