Queensland Health Minister Cameron Dick has slammed federal government changes to public hospital funding, saying they will take more than 8000 doctors and nurses out of the state’s health system.
Mr Dick says changes to the way the federal government will fund hospitals from 2017/18 will remove the equivalent of 8337 jobs for doctors, nurses and health practitioners from the Queensland health system by 2024/25.
He told the Australian Medical Association’s national conference in Brisbane on Saturday the change would shift the burden of Australia’s ageing population on to states and territories.
“If the Abbott government’s argument is that the Commonwealth can’t afford to share 50 per cent of this burden, then how on earth could the states afford to carry 100 per cent of that burden?” he said.
The federal government plans to change the way it funds public hospitals from 2017/18, indexing its funding on population growth and the consumer price index.
Labor and the AMA say Treasury figures revealed during a Senate estimates hearing show the measure will rip $57 billion out of public hospitals by 2024/25.
AMA president Brian Owler says Australia is facing a “man-made crisis” in public hospitals.
“Hospital funding is not an elastic concept where levels of funding can be determined according to political demands and budget pressures,” Associate Professor Owler told the conference.
Health Minister Sussan Ley denied on Friday that the government was “pulling the rug” from public hospitals.
She said efficiencies needed to be found, with unnecessary presentations costing $3 billion a year.
Changes needed to be made to Medicare and public hospital funding before the system reached a crisis point, she said.