Debus condemns rising health costs
May 16, 2007

The Labor candidate for Macquarie, Bob Debus, today condemned the Howard Government for failing to deliver affordable health and dental care to families in the Blue Mountains.

New figures reveal that Australians are paying more for health care than people in many other Commonwealth countries.

“Working families in the Blue Mountains are being hit for six from all sides,” said Mr Debus.

“John Howard’s policies have failed to keep a lid on rising health costs.”

A report on international health comparisons by the Commonwealth Fund health policy think-tank showed that almost three times as many Australians have gone without health care because of cost as people in the United Kingdom.

“It's very hard to keep the lid on a family budget these days and rising health costs make life even harder,” said Mr Debus.

“People should not have to worry about health and dental costs — Mr Howard’s Government should have been delivering these services for everyone in the Blue Mountains.”

The new figures reveal that almost twice as many Australians as British people have avoided going to the dentist when they needed to because they could not pay the dentist bills.

Across Australia, 34 per cent of people could not pay for a prescription or skipped a recommended medical test, treatment or follow-up, or had a medical problem but did not see a doctor because of cost. In the UK, that figure is only 13% and 26 per cent in Canada.

And 43% of Australians needed dental care but did not see a dentist because of high costs. In the UK, only 24% of people could say the same.

Australia also does worse than Canada and New Zealand.

The new figures support a recent survey from the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare that found that more than one in five Australians were going without recommended dental treatment because of cost. More than 10 per cent of Australians had not visited a dentist in the last five years, and one in six people avoided certain foods because of problems with their teeth during the last year.

“Families know they're being hit hard by rising health costs and they know the Government has done very little for them on this front,” said Mr Debus.