Compiled as part of a submission to a federal parliamentary inquiry, the research reveals that non-urban Australians are hospitalised for preventable conditions at up to triple the rate of those living in urban areas.
Adding insult to injury, rural Australians not only have limited access to GPs, specialists, and preventive care, but – when they do – they often pay significantly more, despite being older, sicker and earning less.
Millions of Australians who live hours from the nearest private hospital are being railroaded into buying expensive private health insurance which they simply cannot use.
Key findings:
- Small rural towns have 26% fewer GPs than metro areas. Remote communities have 37% fewer.
- Major cities have ten times more specialists per person than small rural towns.
- Major cities receive over $24 billion in Medicare benefits per year, while regional and remote Australians receive a combined $2 billion.
- This equates to about $1200 per person in cities and regional hubs, $600 per person in remote communities and $335 per person in very remote communities.
- For preventable conditions, people living in rural and remote areas are hospitalised at rates, two to three times higher than those in urban areas.
The analysis makes four recommendations to make quality healthcare more accessible and affordable in rural Australia – and save lives:
- Introduce a remoteness loading on Medicare services.
- Provide additional funding for multidisciplinary teams to set up in regional areas.
- Government to directly provide essential services which are currently inadequate in rural and remote communities.
- Exempt rural Australians from private health insurance surcharges where no private services are available.
"Through their taxes, all Australians fund Medicare with the promise of universal access to healthcare. But for Australians living in the bush, this promise has been broken," said Jack Thrower, Senior Economist at The Australia Institute.
"You cannot call Medicare a universal health care scheme if having access to the scheme depends on where you live. Right now, it may offer equal entitlement, but it delivers unequal care.
"The rural heath divide is not an unavoidable geographical fact; it is the predicable and preventable result of bad health policy.
"Medicare incentivises volume over value or quality of care. This means running a viable medical practice is just about impossible in rural and remote areas. Ending the rural health divide requires government action, either helping providers set up shop in rural communities or intervening to directly provide these services.
"Unless Medicare is reformed, rural and remote Australians will keep being treated like second-class citizens, dying younger and from treatable conditions."
