Australia's private hospital sector looks forward to working with Mark Butler, the new Minister for Health and Aged Care, to set Australia's health care system up for post-COVID-19 recovery, with the first policy priority being the critical healthcare workforce shortage, says Australian Private Hospitals Association (APHA) CEO Michael Roff.
Mr Roff said after 12 months as Shadow Minister, Mr Butler has a good understanding of the issues facing the health system and previous experience as a Minister and Assistant Health Minister.
"Mr Butler is taking on the health care portfolio at an important time for the sector, as elective surgery backlogs continue to escalate and the workforce shortages affecting the entire health and aged care system.
"The private hospital sector alone has a shortfall of 5,500 nurses and urgently needs at least 1000 skilled migrant nurses. We want to work with the new Federal Government to enhance incentives for nurses to come to Australia – by improving residency options and reducing the red tape from the process.
"In turn, private hospitals have an important role to play in training Australia's emerging local health workforce, they already do this, at some considerable cost to themselves, but they have capacity to do more, and we welcome an opportunity to discuss how we can contribute."
Mr Roff said the latest Australian Prudential Regulation Authority (APRA) data showed that in the last two years more than 390,000 anticipated private hospital admissions did not occur. Over 100,000 of these 'missing episodes' were added in the first three months of 2022 alone, further increasing elective surgery wait times.
"All of the gains made in reducing the elective surgery backlog in 2021 have been wiped out by surgery restrictions put in place during the Omicron wave. Now we must start again.
"Private hospitals cannot do this without a healthcare workforce and we are in an international fight to attract them. The UK, Canada and France are all offering enhanced residency pathways for health care workers who choose to move there, and Australia needs to follow suit or our whole health system will suffer.
"We already raised health workforce shortages with Mr Butler when he was Shadow Minister and addressing these issues will be the first and most important policy priority we raise when we meet with him as Health Minister," Mr Roff said.
Mr Roff also welcomed Ged Kearney as Assistant Minister for Health and Aged Care. Ms Kearney has also held this portfolio in Opposition and will have an excellent understanding of issues impacting nurses following her years as Federal Secretary of the Australian Nursing Federation and as a nurse who started her career in a private hospital.
"APHA looks forward to working with the new Federal Health team to advance the issues of Australia's health care system and the post-COVID-19 recovery," Mr Roff said.
