Category: Health

Medicine is changing.  In Australia a baby born today will live, on average, for 90 years or more.  The common infectious killer-diseases have been eliminated.  The treatment of cancer is becoming a success story, far different from the horror with which cancer was viewed by my parents and their generation in the 1950s.  Heart disease still kills people, but often in their 80s and not their 50s.  The new medicine will put together information from a person’s DNA, their environment and diet, their habits and choices, and meld this into the new medicine, a medicine that will try to use this knowledge to prevent disease.  That is the message of the analysis of the road map for “The future of precision medicine in Australia” report recently launched by the Australian Learned Academies of Australia (ACOLA).  (more…)

Private health insurers have asked the Commonwealth Government to prevent patients paying for public hospital services through their private health insurance (PHI).  This would be grossly unfair for those people in non-metropolitan Australia who are enticed into PHI through the Medicare Levy Surcharge, but have no private hospitals in their region. More basically, the Government should abolish its $10 billion subsidy to PHI, and direct the savings to funding private hospitals more efficiently and equitably.   (more…)

The Tasmanian election on March 3^rd will provide a watershed moment in public health not just in Tasmania but for Australia as well. (more…)

Over the holidays I have very much enjoyed watching on television Australia winning the Ashes series, although they seem to be exhausted after the celebrations and are performing poorly in the ODI series. The visual TV coverage on Channel 9 is outstanding. The camera crews do a great job. I enhance my enjoyment by minimising the audio content. Except for the opening and closing of each session, and at the fall of each wicket, I keep my TV console on mute. Channel 9 is destroying a well-earned cricket legacy. Perhaps the loss of Richie Benaud was the beginning of the end.

But that is the good news. Unfortunately I can’t get away from the almost saturation picture coverage of junk food (KFC) and alcohol (XXXX and Canadian Club). Last year it was Victorian Bitter and Bear-Wine-and-Spirits or BWS.  (more…)

While in the real world consumers struggle to meet private health care costs, health funds are hoping for yet more government help. (more…)

The forthcoming round of private health insurance (PHI) premium increases — touted by the government as the lowest in a decade — will mean premiums have risen nearly 80% since 2008, far ahead of inflation and a good demonstration of why PHI companies have racked up big profit increases in recent years. (more…)

Over the last few years much as been written on the issue of out of pocket (OOPs) medical expenses in Australia including a number of contributions in this newsletter. There has been a Senate enquiry and much coverage in the media. The issue of out of pocket expenses is not new – the Grattan Institute conducted a review last year pointing out their rapid increase and that they were impacting on the most vulnerable in society . While a recent OECD Report (https://www.oecd.org/…/Health-at-a-Glance-2015-Key-Findings-AUSTRALIA.pdf) showed that in Australia OOPs account for 20% of expenditure on health care , slightly higher than the OECD average of 19%. By contrast, out-of-pocket costs account for only 10% of health spending in the United Kingdom, 13% in New Zealand and 14% in Canada, which have similar government funded health systems. Out-of-pocket costs also comprise a low proportion of health spending in France (7%), whose health system is largely funded by social security.   (more…)

Mental health problems arising out of modern despair have to be tackled with insights gained from the day-to-day lives of society’s outcasts and the social sciences.  Matthew Fisher, (Australia’s policy failure on mental health, Pearls and Irritations, 14 December 2017) argues that Australian mental health policies have failed: “(We) are subject to a deafening silence from politicians, organisations and the key individuals who shape Australia’s policy discourse and action on mental health”. The ubiquitous mental health problems arising out of social conditions and chronically stressed lives are neglected: “The social causes of mental illness and their impacts on populations, as something we might act on, are largely hidden”.  (more…)

A well-known and respected doctor has written to me about caring for his loved wife.  He outlines a compelling and human story.  With his permission I share with readers his account of the burdens and cost of caring. John Menadue.   (more…)

Governments have yet to create a coherent strategy to help the almost three million Australians providing informal care. (more…)

While the “Fire and the Fury” surrounding  the chaos at the White House dominates media reporting on the Trump presidency, the power of the office is being utilised to implement a myriad of bad decisions that will have very long-lasting effects. Nowhere is this more obvious than in the plans Trump has to slash funding for science and medicine. (more…)

In 2016 I wrote about the call for a sugar tax, especially on sugar sweetened drinks, to address Australia’s obesity problem.  What has happened since then?  (more…)

Queensland’s victory over NSW in the 1 June  game lin 2016 was reported as the highest rating State of Origin match ever and ‘the top TV event of 2016.’  Both teams carried alcohol advertising on their clothing into the match.  The association of alcohol with sport is deep, complex and profitable. Sport provides a lucrative vehicle for advertising and in turn many codes have come to depend heavily on the support of alcohol sponsors. The relationship is one of co-dependency. (more…)

The statistics do not support the view that there are big differences in sugar consumption between the fat and the thin.  We need to define our enemy clearly in the battle against obesity. (more…)

Modifying our own behaviour in health-promoting directions is sensible but for sustainable, nation-wide change we need to take action of a different kind. (more…)

The health of future generations is being mortgaged as a result of environmental degradation that threatens to reverse the health gains achieved over the past century, according to Dr Helen Clark, a global health advocate.

Clark, formerly Administrator of the UN Development Programme and Prime Minister of New Zealand, told the recent launch of the University of Sydney’s new Planetary Health Platform that political will and leadership from civil society and the private sector are needed to tackle the major threats to planetary health – as well as collaborations across silos.

Her speech is published in full below with permission, and is also available at her website.

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The private health insurance rebate is an important element in maintaining the attractiveness of private health insurance membership. The government rebate subsidises the cost of private health insurance premiums (hospital, general, and ambulance policies). It is usually applied in the form of an upfront discount to the consumer on the price of the premium, although it can be claimed back through the tax system. The rebate amount varies, depending on income levels and age. (more…)

Evidence on social determinants of health, health inequities and primary disease prevention and health promotion present many, currently under-utilised opportunities for Australian Government Health Ministers to genuinely be Ministers for health as well as for remedial healthcare services. (more…)

Australia rates highly on international measures of physical health status such as life expectancy at birth, suggesting we are healthier than ever before, but the data on mental health and illness tells a very different story. On measures of mental health and illness we are doing poorly and compare badly to other OECD countries. Despite a large body of evidence on social determinants of metal health and illness, our policy responses are overwhelmingly dominated by individualised responses such as drug treatments, counselling and resilience programs. This unwillingness to recognise major social causes of mental illness is a national policy failure.  (more…)

On an almost weekly basis now I’m asked as a medical specialist to write a letter to help a patient be accepted by Centrelink as unable to work. My letter and that of the patient’s general practitioner are then assessed by staff with limited or no medical training. (more…)