media releases

“The health of patients with cataracts is being forgotten by all major parties in the debate about Medicare rebates for cataract surgery,” said Dr Tim Woodruff, President, Doctors Reform Society.

“The Federal Government’s main interest appears to be to save money even though it knows that some eye surgeons will not reduce their fees, thus leaving patients to pay more or simply not have the vision saving operation,” said Dr Woodruff

“The eye surgeons are clearly putting interest in defending their own income in front of providing affordable access to patients for an operation they know can transform their patients’ lives. And now the Federal Opposition is playing politics with the issue in a way which may lead to patients getting no Medicare rebate at all.”

“But all three players continue to ignore the basic problem which leads to this unhealthy debacle,” said Dr Woodruff. “The weakened public hospital system upon which the majority of Australians depend for their cataract surgery, cannot possibly compete with a private industry which is so heavily taxpayer funded but which is only accessible to those who can afford it. Many elderly are desperate enough to have private health cover because they don’t want to be queuing at the public hospitals to get their lives back by having their vision restored.”

“It is this taxpayer funding of the private system which sets the scene for private specialists to charge almost what they like, knowing that there are enough patients who are desperate enough to pay extra to avoid public hospital queues.”

“Rather than ignoring patients and attempting to control a fundamentally flawed private industry, the Federal Government must adequately fund the public system so that it can compete for patients and doctors against the taxpayer funded private industry. It also needs to address the ‘closed shop’ training of specialists to ensure there are sufficient specialists for our patients.

Dr Tim Woodruff
President
Doctors Reform Society

Dr Con Costa
Vice President
Doctors Reform Society

]]