The final review of natural therapies confirms that there is insufficie­nt evidence to say the treatments benefit patients.
Removing unproven natural therapies from the scope of the health insurance rebate is unlikely to deliver sufficient savings to warrant the cost of doing so, Health Minister Sussan Ley says.
The Australian has obtained the final review of natural therapies, commissioned by the former Labor government to ensure taxpayers were not subsidising bogus medicine, confirming there is insufficient evidence to say the treatments benefit patients.
Chief Medical Officer Chris Baggoley chaired a specially convened committee of experts and tasked the Office of the National Health and Medical Research Council with examining the published evidence on 17 natural therapies.
“Overall, there was not reliable, high-quality evidence available to allow assessment of the clinical effectiveness of any of the natural therapies for any health conditions,” the report concludes.
Despite the damning findings, delivered to government months ago, Ms Ley would only say the issue would be considered as part of a broader review of value for money in insurance.
“I certainly support the theory of government rebates being paid only for health treatments that are evidence-based,” Ms Ley told The Australian yesterday.
“This is certainly the approach we are taking to our review of all 5700 items on the Medicare Benefits Schedule and people would expect the same of taxpayer funds invested in private health insurance.
“The problem here is this was purely about desperate budget cuts for Labor, not evidence, and it shows in their dodgy accounting on this measure.”
Labor estimated the measure would save $32 million a year, but that was before changes reducing the scope of the rebate.
Some options being considered by the current government would also supersede any move to block natural therapies.
Health funds privately argue that covering natural therapies such as yoga and shiatsu attracts younger, healthier members whose premiums are needed to offset the costs of older members.
The findings mirror those in a draft report revealed by The Australian in January, and follow a similar review by the Department of Veterans Affairs that led to certain natural therapies not being covered under gold and white card arrangements.
At the time, it was expected that the Coalition government would remove natural therapies from the scope of the rebate on principle, if not financial grounds, with then finance minister Mathias Cormann declaring that “we will continue to be uncompromising in the pursuit of waste and will not rest until any inappropriate expenditure has been eliminated”.
The revelations on natural therapies come as a new report from the OECD urged the federal government to hand responsibility for GP services to the states as an incentive to keep people out of hospital.
Amid ongoing federation talks, as well as a range of health reviews, the OECD has taken a look at Australia’s health system and questioned the fragmentation of services and inefficient funding mechanisms.
In the report due to be released today, the OECD warns that rising rates of chronic disease will expose weaknesses in the system, including the maldistribution of the workforce, lack of services in remote areas, slow uptake of electronic health records and “a surprising lack of data on the quality and outcomes of care (that) marks out Australia”.