"As Turnock points out, the largest number of beneficiaries of public health can never show up at a public hearing and can never write a letter to the editor praising their health department because they have not yet been born. The public health movement is constantly working to make sure the world our children inherit is a decent place. But often theirs is a thankless job."
—Rachel's Democracy and Health News, 13 April 2006; Bernard Turnock's Public Health — What it is and How it Works (3rd Edition)
The problem
The public health system is in crisis.
Trends supporting this view
Insufficient numbers of emergency service workers
Emergency services spokespeople say they can no longer guarantee help to people in an emergency situation because there is not enough staff to handle the demand. The problem is worse in high populations within cities, and for those patients living in country towns.
For example, the Ambulance Employee's Union spokesman Steve McGhie, in responding to claims of delays in Ambulance Victoria in getting to patients, was quoted as saying:
"It's widespread, we're seeing evidence right across the state that there are major problems cropping up in regard to delayed response times because there's not enough ambulance crews available to respond to the high demand in emergency cases.
The demand has been increasing at about the rate of 6 per cent per annum for the last 10 years.
The cases [in rural towns] are far more complicated, they have to travel further and longer distances under a great deal of pressure and on some occasions we're seeing ambulance paramedics respond on their own and that's very dangerous." (ABC News: More paramedics urged to cut ambulance wait. 28 August 2012.)
Further evidence of the shortage in staff to handle the weight of emergency calls from the population can also be seen in an article published in the Brisbane newspaper, The Courier-Mail:
"SERIOUS staffing shortfalls in the Queensland Ambulance Service have been revealed in a secret file that has been compiled by frontline paramedics.
The covert audit of crew shortages and station closures, obtained by The Courier-Mail, shows communities in some of the state's busiest areas are regularly being left exposed. Despite fears of career damage or job loss, paramedics logged almost 150 examples of understaffing in recent months.
The campaign, not driven by their union, includes details of shifts not being filled, 24-hour stations unattended - often at night - and officers working alone or cobbled together with staff from other areas.
Officers say the "roster holes" are caused by a "cost-sensitive management" and there simply are not enough people to cope with a rising workload, or to cover leave." (Hall, Peter. Paramedics details Queensland Ambulance Service staff shortage : The Courier-Mail. 11 February 2012.)
In support of this claim, a QAS paramedic officer was quoted by The Courier-Mail as saying:
"All we want is our shifts to be filled so we can serve the community effectively. The system is running too lean and the pressure on us is enormous.
There are holes everywhere and busy areas like the Gold Coast and Sunshine Coast are seriously short, especially over the holiday period where they run the same rosters as the rest of the year. This is madness given the population can double during these times.
We only have bare-bones staffing and are worried about what would happen if we have a major incident, such as a bus crash."
As for high populations in a city such as Toronto, Canada, the Toronto EMS Paramedics group stated on its web site:
"We need more paramedics to service an aging population, and to continue to find ways to improve the delivery of pre-hospital public health care."
From this quote we also see the impact of an ageing population on emergency services.
Another factor affecting the number of emergency service requests from patients are what some professional medical experts describe as "heavy users". According to the CMAJ Medical Journal, Howard J. Ovens and Benjamin T.B. Chan reported in their article published 16 October 2001:
"Patients who make multiple visits to emergency departments (EDs) have been called "heavy users," "repeaters" and "frequent fliers." Previous studies have reported that such patients comprise 0.2% to 11% of the ED population and account for 1.9% to 32% of total visits. Heavy users have a high prevalence of psychosocial problems and often have co-existing chronic medical conditions. They are believed to account for a disproportionately large share of ED resource use, and most ED staff perceive them to be a burden." (Ovens and Chan. Heavy users of emergency services: a population-based review: CMAJ Medical Journal. 16 October 2001, pp.1049-1050)
The evidence by way of doctors in hospitals
Doctors and nurses complain of insufficient beds and funding to support the population in public hospitals. When election time comes around, miraculously the public hospital system is given an injection of extra funds to keep the health professionals quiet.
The stress of handling excess patients in hospitals puts a toll, not only on those who work in the health care system, but also on the aspiration of many young would-be doctors and nurses while those already in the profession are considering early retirement. Otherwise, doctors and surgeons seeks ways to maximise their own profit for the work they do, or choose places where the demand for their services is low but can ask for high fees to be paid by patients.
UPDATE
15 November 2004
There has been talk of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons in Victoria controlling the number of surgical training positions and in which hospitals these future surgeons can work in. The reasoning behind this approach is because the top surgeons in the country can maintain their very high salaries and/or earn extra money by imposing high fees on public hospitals for their services. This may be to partly offset the high cost of insurance to protect themselves from litigation by their patients. But it is also because they see the value of creating a low-supply in a high-demand situation as required to maximise their own profits by keeping the numbers of surgeons helping the Australian community to a low level.
UPDATE
15 November 2004
Under considerable pressure from the State Labor Government to balance this profit-mentality of the top surgeons with the moral and social obligation they must show to help the health of the general public, the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons will now offer 30 more surgical training places just to appease the State Labor Governments. Other changes include allowing trainee surgeons to train and work in the state in which they had been trained if they so choose. This would put an end to the national ranking system which had denied experienced NSW doctors wanting to become a surgeon from working in NSW and Victorian trainee surgeons being forced to move into NSW to fill the positions instead.
The college will now work closely with the Australian Consumer and Competition Commission (ACCC) to ensure its selection process is transparent and fair.
The college has warned that extra health funding will be needed to pay for the 60 new positions in the next couple of years assuming of course the salaries of the new surgeons remains where they are today. Given how the Federal Government fought tooth and claw to minimise health spending, this warning will place even greater demands on taxpayers.
Or perhaps the Federal Government should consider the funding to Defence a low priority and redirect the money to help improve the health of all Australians for a few years? Let's see how far the funding will go to improve everyone's health.
UPDATE
1 February 2005
The definition of elective surgery has been extended to include surgery for people who are not experiencing a "life threatening" health problem and therefore considered the lowest priority. This includes hip-replacement surgery and abnormally large growths on the surface of the ear or face. Even if the person's health problems will create severe psychological trauma or seriously reduce the quality of life of someone (e.g. it forces him/her to be permanently house-bound), the shear numbers of people requiring surgery has forced doctors to categorise more and more surgery as elective, leaving only the most serious cases to handle. While those who must attend a hospital for trivial things such as giving birth to a baby are forced through the system as quickly as possible like a bunch of cattle. Until people take greater responsibility for their own health and think about their actions, the population levels are reduced, and businesses produce more healthier foods, the hospital system will soon reach the point of total collapse and with it the economy in its present form.
UPDATE
14 July 2006
A rare event in the history of Australian politics was unveiled today when State Premiers finally agreed with the Australian Prime Minister John Howard on something. This time it is over the training of doctors and nurses — the new deal will see a boost in their numbers (just so long as some rural communities will benefit from it rather than the continuing exodus of doctors to the cities). Well, to be precise, nearly all the states got the extra medical school places they wanted except for NSW which received one-tenth of the places requested. The agreement has been described as a landmark Commonwealth-state co-operation.
The evidence by way of patients
Patients have reported long waiting lists for surgery. Unless there is a clear emergency needing immediate attention (and a credit card is available for U.S. citizens), most doctors and hospital administrators will push the least important and less likely to benefit from the help type of cases to the end of the waiting list.
A top Australian heart surgeon who appeared on ABC's television talk show Q & A on Thursday 23 July 2009 stated 90 per cent of the Australian health budget is spent on providing health care to people on life-support systems with little or no chance of survival and the elderly. Unless there are clearer signs of people able to recover from their conditions (i.e. better technology) and elderly people had made decisions to look after their health throughout life and continue to make those decisions including being independent and living at home or with another family and providing their wealth of knowledge, emotional support and physical contribution for a healthy body and mind, the health budget will continue to be put under strain when supporting the health of the entire population.
UPDATE
13 January 2004
Reports of patients in Australian public hospitals being quietly euthanised just to free up beds for other patients have started to emerge. Police is investigating the matter.
Certain business professionals are not taking the matter seriously enough
t would appear many governments of the world don't want to acknowledge high profits of businesses is part of the fundamental issue in this debate on the health crisis.
For example, businesses prefer to sell junk food over healthy foods because it is cheaper to manufacture, tastes better, and more of the stuff can be sold to the people.
With many people conscious of the price of food and the need to minimise their own costs, we find the major supermarkets (Woolworths and Coles) are inclined to provide a large section towards junk foods. This section is usually expanded to hold more of the cheaper junk foods as well as lower quality fresh foods to poorer suburbs compared to the affluent ones. This move by supermarkets may be understandable as expensive food items are rarely bought by poorer members of the community. But it should not be at the expense of the health of people in poorer suburbs. Supermarkets must take responsibility to sell better foods to the people. Milk, water, fruit, vegetables and fish should be priced to be cheaper. If necessary, governments or supermarkets should impose a food tax on junk foods to help offset the higher prices for healthier foods so people can make healthier decisions.
For example, soft drinks such as Coke should be priced as more expensive than milk and water. If necessary, raising the price slightly for soft drinks can help to reduce prices for healthier water, milk and certain types of fruit juices (i.e. low in suger).
The evidence by way of available funding by the government to support the health care system
There is an observation that governments, both at State and Federal levels, are struggling to fund the public health care system (3) as if suggesting an over-population issue, or too many people in employment are unhealthy for some reason. The Government may even see the public health care system as a bottomless black hole where any amount of money thrown at it would disappear without getting back much from the investment. This attitude changes dramatic just prior to an election before later returning to the previous attitude.
For example, the former Liberal (Howard) Government decided to increase the cost of Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS) medications for taxpayers and those unable to continue employment to pay. In other words, where expensive life-saving drugs were previously subsidised by the government to allow people to survive better and for longer, now the Government has seen the opportunity to save money by reducing the subsidies and asking people to pay more for their drugs. As Annette Ellis MP, Australian Federal Member for Canberra and Parliamentary Secretary to the Shadow Minister for Family and Community Services, said:
"The Coalition [Liberal (Howard)] Government attempted to increase the cost of PBS medications by 30% in the May [2002] Budget. Labor voted against this increase and the Bill was defeated in both Houses.
'While we believe there is no doubt that the funding of Australia's health system must be reviewed, raising funds by charging the elderly, the sick and families is just not fair." (1)
UPDATE
20 November 2003
The Australian Federal (Howard) Government has decided to go for what must be described as a desperate Mark 2 Medicare reform to get the Australian public to see how the Government is trying really hard to fix the health care system (spew!). A boost in funding will certainly go a long way. Unfortunately it has taken until the start of an election year for the Government to suddenly see the miraculous benefit of spending in excess of A$2.4 billion over four years (instead of the meagre $917 million in extra funding over four years in the Government previous package known as A Fairer Medicare) to prop up the declining Medicare system.
The Government has also given it a new name for the latest package of reforms. It is now known as MedicarePlus. By changing the name, it is hoped the Government can give the impression to average Australians it has done enough to fix up the health crisis while at the same time make it difficult for the Labor Party to make expensive promises or to have anything substantial by way of good policies to use at election time in 2004.
The Band-Aid solution to Medicare by the Government will include a reasonably generous A$5 bonus per consultation for doctors to bulk-bill concession-card holders and for children up to 16 years old. Nothing like a bit of appeasement with the larger proportion of the Australian population consisting of low- to middle-income families and the less well-off if it can mean a chance to earn a few more extra votes at around election time!
Another change has been to offer a safety net for out-of-pocket medical expenses amounting to 80 per cent of the medical costs paid by the government for low-income patients paying more than $300 and $700 for all other patients. Health Minister Tony Abbott described this policy as "iron clad" as part of his government's election commitment to the Australian people. In his own official words:
"That is an absolutely rock solid, iron-clad commitment."
However, the ultimate aim for the Government is to eventually see Medicare collapse after 2008 through massive blow outs in the budget so that the health care system can be turned into the US-style of privatised health care system where doctors can charge any amount of money it likes and the Government can sit back and do nothing for the people, forcing the rich to get richer and the poor to get poorer and hopefully die quicker. In that way, it is hoped the population will return to a more self-sustainable level where everyone will hopefully have a job designed to support the Australian economy and in return give people a better chance to afford the cost of health care, no matter how expensive it becomes.
UPDATE
20 November 2004
It has taken the Federal (Howard) Government just two weeks before the polls on 9 October 2004 to capitulate to the health demands of the State Premiers with a promise of massive multi-billion dollar extra funding to this sector. This has angered the State Premiers when only last December the Federal Government was crying foul about the lack of money in the coffers for health. The truth is, the Federal Government needed its money from taxpayers to help pay the cost of the blunder in Iraq and to afford major election promises in areas of health and education during this month. In other words, Mr John Howard is trying to buy votes from the Australian people.
UPDATE
14 April 2005
The supposedly "iron clad" election promise from Health Minister Mr Tony Abbott last year has suddenly looked decidedly flimsy today after the government's admission that the safety net was not economically sustainable nearly 5 months after the election. Funnily, for a government that claims it has good economic management skills, it could not predict the budget blowout of the new safety net policy of MedicarePlus estimated to be about A$1.2 billion even though outside observers consisting mainly of health care experts, the Australian Democrats and reporters had warned the government prior to the election of the developing blow out due to increases in the doctors' fees among other known issues at the time. Even Mr Abbott conceded the government knew the cost was blowing out just prior to the election, but kept it a secret claiming the government needed more time to see what would happen. Now Mr Howard has allowed Mr Abbott to take a well-earned rest as the Prime Minister took the brunt of questions from the media, saying:
"I understand people will be critical, and I regret this, I am very sorry that it has occurred. We had a difficult choice to make. It's either let the thing drift to an unsustainable position or take these painful, but necessary, steps now [while] still retaining a generous safety net." (The Canberra Times: Quotes of the week. 16 April 2005, p.B6. & Metherell, Mark et al. PM, Abbott sorry about Medicare: The Sydney Morning Herald. 16-17 April 2005, p.4.)
Some people have welcomed the changes made to the Medicare safety net. As Troy Cox of Docklands in Victoria said:
"John Howard has made the right decision on Medicare. We must prepare for the consequences of an ageing population. It is sensible to make small adjustments to health care now rather than bigger, more painful adjustments in the decades ahead." (The Sydney Morning Herald: More of that mean spirit in safety net changes (Opinion & Letters). 16-17 April 2005, p.38.)
It is a pity such an attitude to changes is not reflected well by Mr Howard when it comes to the environment and promoting renewable energy sources.
But why wasn't the cost of the safety net calculated or, if it was, calculated accurately based on actual trends such as the increasing doctors' fees? The calculation should have shown it was unsustainable, in which case what's the purpose of introducing the safety net in the first place if it is not going to greatly benefit the Australian people?
Was this meant to be Mr Howard's way of buying extra votes from the Australian public at election time? Or did Mr Abbott and Mr Howard have the calculations roughly written down on a piece of parliamentary toilet paper and called it a health policy? If so, it is certainly not worth the paper it is written on! Either way, it doesn't look good for the Federal Government.
To rein in the runaway costs of the Medicare safety net, the government will increase the threshold to $500 and $1,000 for low and middle/high-income patients respectively (and so effectively curbing around 400,000 Australians, mostly low-income earners, from qualifying under the program) before paying the 80 per cent safety net. A hard blow indeed for low-income patients and an unmistakable show of deceptive and misleading behaviour by a government that is more interested in political self-preservation than the preservation of the health and financial circumstances of its own people.
As opposition leader Mr Kim Beazley said:
"This is a class A, rolled gold, world-best practice piece of deceit..." (Cronin, Danielle. More Medicare changes possible: PM: The Canberra Times. 16 April 2005, p.3.)
Deceit is looking like the right word. Prime Minister Mr John Howard may have been able to get away with breaking another election promise (among numerous others including the rather infamous one where he claimed that interest rates would not rise under a coalition government, and another in not sending more troops to Iraq(, but not so with the safety net election promise. By breaking the safety net election promise to add to his swag of broken promises, the Prime Minister does not have the luxury of claiming he had no knowledge of what was happening. He knew the situation well. People have been telling the Prime Minister (and Mr Abbott) about the budget blow out for some time (including an official report published in the Sydney Morning Herald as early as September 2004 stating the blow out will reach A$1 billion). Mr Howard had figures showing this was happening according to his Health Minister, yet he chose to ignore it and did not make or show accurately the calculations needed to confirm his figures, in stark contradiction to his usually strong economic management principles.
As Robyn Prygoda of Nowra in NSW said:
"The Howard Government trumpets its economic management skills yet it consistently underestimates the budget surplus and, if it is to be believed, couldn't predict from November to this month the cost of the Medicare safety net.
'Look out for budget cuts to essential services this year and next and then, surprise, surprise, a budget windfall to fund another round of promises which will be broken within six months of the election." (The Sydney Morning Herald: More of that mean spirit in safety net changes (Opinion & Letters). 16-17 April 2005, p.38.)
The Prime Minister knew that by pleading ignorance it would give him a political advantage over his opponents in the election, as opposed to choosing to be honest to his people by admitting he made a mistake in his budget analysis.
Perhaps all promises in the future should be made legally binding statements and in writing to ensure all governments of the day really think about what they are saying to the Australian people before committing themselves to the promises. Not such a bad suggestion. As Anne Brown of Bowral in NSW said:
"I was watching the news on Thursday night abouyt the Government's alteration to the Medicare safety net and I thought perhaps it would be an idea to make all politicians' pre-election promises legally binding statements. In other words, wouldn't they think twice before making statements that they would be legally held responsible for?" (The Sydney Morning Herald: More of that mean spirit in safety net changes (Opinion & Letters). 16-17 April 2005, p.38.)
Evidence of the government's low priority to the health of its citizens
As an example, the former Federal (Howard) Government had been undercutting funding to the public health system by A$1.1 billion every year as State Premiers have discovered after the May 2007 budget. Not surprising considering R-wing governments are notorious for seeing health as a low priority when compared to more important things like economic growth and funding to Defence.
It really shows the priority health has for the Federal Government.
And as doctors and nurses cry out for more funding and other resources while working long hours, it is amazing how the government (in particular the R-wing variety) does not want to establish an honours system for health professionals for their important role in the community in case it might emphasise the health care problem as well as see health care as a low priority. As M.J. Dickenson of Ngunnawal, Canberra, said:
"Jennifer Saunders (CT Letters, February 17) is spot-on in calling for an overhaul of the honours system.
I proposed my daughter, thinking she might get some small recognition after almost 40 years of dedicated nursing in public hospitals, whilst at the same time raising a family. My proposal was rejected. Now had she been a public servant, an MP, an Olympic gold-medal winner, well..." (4)
In the meantime, carers, the unpaid nurses of society, are rarely if ever acknowledged for the free services they provide to look after the health and wellbeing of members of the community. In Australia alone, it is estimated that carers in totality save the governments around $20 billion a year in caring for people at home.
The best the Federal (Howard) Government can muster following the May 2007 budget is a one-off payment of A$600 per patient for every full-time carer. As for businesses selling unhealthy products, choosing a peaceful solution to conflict, and reducing population levels, there will be no changes here. The economy and getting enough people to consume products from businesses is more important than the health of the population and the hospital system at the present time.
The evidence that governments take the health matter seriously at around election time
As a classic example, the Federal election had been called by Australian Prime Minister John Howard, with the day set for 24 November 2007.
After the announcement, former Finance Minister Mr Peter Costello immediately released his tax plan showing a A$34 billion slush fund had been collected over the past 4 years to spend on substantial tax cuts for people in employment. He then urges the then opposition leader Kevin Rudd to come up with his own tax plan, Mr Rudd counters with a tax plan of his own claiming he can help families, education and the health system. Then suddenly, Mr Costello says he just happens to have more in the slush fund to pay for health and education. Amazing. So over the past 4 years the Howard Government has managed to withhold money to the health system (and education), putting people's lives at risk, so the Prime Minister can sway the Australian people to vote for his government at election time with all manner of financial sweeteners. The talk of slash funds came as stories of women being forced to give bith to babies in hopital toilets and closets because there isn't enough doctors and funds to support them started to roll in.
It just shows the more a R-wing government reveals it can spend the money on social services but hasn't, the more the Australian people will resent the two-faced hypocritical bastard the government is.
This R-wing Howard government is happy to spend big bucks for Defence and the troops in Iraq and at the same time reduce spending to education, health and everything else just to force people to suffer or somehow get a job, and then suddenly say it has the money to support the social and educational services needed by the population at election time. This is the kind of thing that could bring down governments simply because it cannot be honest and do the right thing by all the people.
The evidence by way of health insurance companies
Health insurance companies has to increase the cost of their premiums for basic health care. And it isn't deemed to be a profit-motivated action by the insurance companies. According to Private Health Insurance Administration Council chief executive Hayle Ginnane in Australia:
"Generally, the entire [private health insurance] industry is operating on very tight margins — 90 cents in every contribution dollar goes out again in benefits.
'Estimates benefits paid for contributors will exceed A$7.5 billion this year. Increases in contribution rates are necessary to meet these increased benefits in a mainly not-for-profit market. The 30 per cent [government] rebate [estimated to provide $2.4 billion] provides support in meeting the costs of contributions." (2)
The main cause for the increase in premiums every year is said to be (i) an increase in the number of people entering private hospitals and making claims, and (ii) the higher costs of treatment. As for property insurance premium hikes, it is primarily large numbers of people claiming for lost or damaged property which is said to be the real cause.
UPDATE
Higher insurance premiums could also be an issue of greed by some claimants wanting to receive money from the insurance companies for any reason (a problem with the way Western society emphasises money as more important than anything else).
UPDATE
December 2005
With yet another increase in health premiums across many health funds — in some cases rising 40 per cent compared to four years ago and for some people paying an extra A$200 or more for their premiums — chief of health insurer MBF, Mr Eric Dodd, argued most funds are probably not performing well and believes there should be greater transparency and accountability of all health funds before asking for a premium hike. He summed up the situation with a telling quote:
"If you wanted it to be, the CEO of a health fund could be the most fantastic job in the world. You could play golf five times a week." (The Sydney Morning Herald: Incompetence and kickbacks — just another year at the office. 7-8 January 2006, p.28.)
UPDATE
7 January 2006
The Federal Government is not entirely innocent of the higher insurance premiums. Gordon Burns of New Lambton, NSW, writes:
"Upon receipt of my annual insurance premiums I notice that government charges constitute a nifty 42 per cent. Included in this is GST on the fire service "levy". No doubt such double taxation is enabled because of the sneaky use of the word levy instead of tax, but such government dishonesty and duplicity should not be allowed to pass unnoticed or unrecorded." (The Sydney Morning Herald: Stung twice (Opinion and Letters). 7-8 January 2006, p.20.)
UPDATE
24 February 2006
The Australian Federal (Howard) Government has approved health insurance companies to raise health insurance premiums for families by A$160 every year to allegedly cover increasing treatment costs, new technologies and the added burden on private hospitals to treat extra patients.
As Australian Health Insurance Association chief Michael Armitage said:
"Premium increases...will cover the additional use of private hospitals, new and expensive technologies and increases in treatment costs." (O'Malley, Sandra. Families' health bill goes up by $160 a year: The Canberra Times. 25 February 2006, p.3.)
The only option for Australian people to minimise health insurance costs at the present time, assuming the current capitalist system is maintained, is to visit http://www.iselect.com.au/. This web site will help you to choose the best and lowest health insurance premium for your needs, assuming you can still afford the premiums.
UPDATE
25 February 2006
Young Australians feel tempted by the idea of deserting their private health insurance funds in droves owing to the high premiums with very little in return or benefit. Some have actually done something about it by letting their insurance premiums lapse.
Old-age people are contemplating a similar move because of their low incomes (unless you are an ex-company director) except their situation is a little more complicated in that the older you are, the more you need health insurance to pay for the slightly more regular hospital treatments and hefty medical bills.
Those aged somewhere in the middle will hopefully have well-paid and fairly permanent jobs to be able to afford the cost of hefty premiums without complaint.
This general observation is supported by statistics claiming since 2001, 477,000 people (or 2 per cent) aged up to 54 years had left private health insurance, while 445,000 aged over 55 years had joined.
In focussing on the total numbers who are with private health insurance funds, the Federal Health Minister Mr Tony Abbott claims people are sticking with private health insurance because the products and services are getting better. Interestingly it is not because the cost of the premiums are going down. Mr Abbott adds:
"The Commonwealth Government has carefully scrutinised all applications [from the six largest health funds for premium increases] to ensure the premium adjustments are the minimum needed." (O'Malley, Sandra. Families' health bill goes up by $160 a year: The Canberra Times. 25 February 2006, p.3.)
This may explain why the increase this year will average out across the six largest health funds at 5.68 per cent higher than last year's premium costs for the 8.8 million Australians with health cover compared to nearly 8 per cent last year from the previous year, 7.58 per cent in 2004 and 7.4 per cent rise in 2003. Possibly last year's rise was in anticipation of a slightly lower rise for 2006.
As Abbott said:
"This is the lowest increase across all private health insurance funds since 2001." (O'Malley, Sandra. Families' health bill goes up by $160 a year: The Canberra Times. 25 February 2006, p.3.)
Or if Australians didn't have the nearly 8 per cent rise last year and instead had 7.5 per cent increase, then the rise for this year would be 6.18 per cent. Would Mr Abbott continue to claim it is the lowest since 2001? Nothing like putting a positive spin by reducing the rise this year to 5.68 per cent.
In total, the rise since 2001 has been between 33 and 40 per cent depending on which private health insurance fund you are with.
However the Australian Consumers Association health policy officer Ms Viola Corczak believes no continuously rising health costs are sustainable. Eventually something must give. Either the health system is properly fixed including getting people to become healthier or people will have to get out of the health insurance system altogether leaving only the richest people to pay the highest amount for their premiums.
As Ms Corczak said:
"This rise shows that the private health insurance system is unsustainable." (O'Malley, Sandra. Families' health bill goes up by $160 a year: The Canberra Times. 25 February 2006, p.3.)
Ms Corczak further adds:
"Consumers are not getting value for the money — they are paying more, but still receiving roughly the same benefits." (Pollard, Ruth. Health fund fees up 33% in five years: The Sydney Morning Herald. 25-26 February 2006, p.5.)
She suggests the 30 per cent private health rebate should be removed and the money used to fix up the public hospital system and assisting with preventative care for individuals in the community.
The most the Federal Government can do in this situation while it keeps a surplus of $A15 billion for its election year and spends phenomenal amounts of money on Defence to support the war in Iraq, is to spend a few tens of millions of dollars in television advertising convincing young children to get outdoors and exercise more. Now a recent study has found the money is wasteful in that it isn't the exercise being the problem, but rather the amount of consuming of junk foods in the name of profit for the food giants which is the issue.
Actually this is not quite correct. The Federal Government has agreed to give an extra A$1 billion to state governments to improve the public health care system. After that, it is dreaming the the problem will be fixed.
UPDATE
29 April 2006
Federal Health Minister Tony Abbott believes the best way to lower health insurance premiums is to sell off Medibank Private. But as Stephen Jackson of Gulgong, NSW, said:
"Tony Abbott says that a privatised Medibank Private would result in lower premiums ("Medibank benefits warning", April 28). Is that in the same way that privatised green slips would reduce premiums? A privatised Commonwealth Bank would reduce fees? A privatised Sydney Airport would reduce costs? The list goes on.
'Pull the other one, Mr Abbott." (The Sydney Morning Herald: A litany of hopes lost in privatisation (Opinion & Letters). 29-30 April 2006, p.32.)
UPDATE
1 July 2006
Apart from a 30 per cent rebate to people who join private health insurance, the Federal (Howard) Government used clever marketing techniques to make the health insurance under Medibank Private look cheap. Through carefully-crafted television advertisements, the cost of the health insurance appears to be only A$1.13 per day or a tad under A$400 per year, remarkable considering the average premiums from other funds is twice this amount. But if you look carefully at the advertisements, it is from A$1.13, meaning it is the most basic health cover you can get. To get a useful health cover, be prepared to pay a lot more. The Government is advertising in this way to help attract young people back to health cover.
UPDATE
23 February 2007
The latest situation in this continuing saga of trying to improve the health system and lower insurance premiums has seen Australian Health Minister Tony Abbott approve a 4.5 per cent increase in premiums on average. This is roughly A$2.00 a week more for families in private health cover.
Mr Abbott put a positive spin on the change saying it is the lowest increase in 6 years and families benefit from the 30 per cent rebate saving around A$1,000 per year. Mr Abbott added:
"Over the last two or three years, we have seen consistently more people coming into private health insurance.
'I think we've had five or six consecutive quarters of substantial growth in the numbers of people with private health insurance and I certainly think that with an even lower increase this year, we're more likely to get more people into private health insurance and not less." (Cronin, Danielle. Government gives health funds nod to up premiums: The Canberra Times. 24 February 2007, p.5.)
Mr Abbott is certainly playing the positive spin doctor today. Perhaps more of him might be welcomed in the public health system.
Unfortunately Mr Abbott cannot skate around the fact that fees have increased by 50 per cent since the Federal Government claimed in 1999 there would be no significant increase in the costs to Australian families over time. The small increase today is likely to be offset by significant increases in the coming years. And we wouldn't be surprised if Labor is to blame for it should they win this year's Federal elections.
As for people joining private health funds in greater numbers, it is likely this is because the population is aging and some people who are getting rich need a reliable health care system to support them in their old age as a form of security.
If reelected, the Federal (Howard) Government plans to sell off Medibank Private. So while the Government argues all it likes about how much they are helping people on private health insurance through the 30 per cent rebate, the Government can also blame health insurance premium hikes on greedy business professionals.
But as President of the Faculty of Public Health Medicine at the Royal Australasian College of Physicians George Rubin, and his colleague Stephen Leeder (a councillor) said:
"...There has never been a public debate in this country about the public subsidy of private health insurance. The overall bill to taxpayers arising from the 30 per cent rebate increases annually with the fee increases granted to insurers. In turn, this adds to the percentage of GDP spent on health care. Yet there is little evidence to suggest that the investment leads to improved health outcomes.
'Is the rebate where taxpayers want their taxes to go? If so, how much? Could the money be better spent improving other areas of health care? The federal opposition [under Kevin Rudd] has not signalled any changes to the policy at this stage, suggesting that it may be comfortable with Medicare progressively becoming a safety net for the poor.
'We are constantly told that Medicare has provided Australians with one of the best health systems in the world. In this election, we should be hearing our politicians fostering debate on health care costs and co-payments and articulating policies that provide for universal health care coverage at the point of service delivery." (The Weekend Australian (Letters to the Editor): Why no debate on health?. 26-27 May 2007, p.18.)
The evidence of how ill-equipped the health care system is in the event of a major epidemic affecting millions of people
As a classic example of how poor the public health system is currently at, talk of a highly contagious airborne flu evolving from, say, the dreaded bird flu and affecting humans would see the health system collapse within days. For a start, the number of people experiencing bird flu symptoms would fill the corridors of every hospital and there isn't enough nurses and doctors to attend to every one of the patients. Next, the businesses and government don't have a plan to create enough anti-flu virus shots designed to tackle the bird flu for the entire population. The size of the population is not sustainable for the current health system.
What makes it ludricrous is the amount of money governments will spend on defence compared to the health system. Where are the priorities in society?
The grim scenario has been extended to bioterrorism. Knowing how much State and Federal Governments are focussing on anti-terrorism measures, what happens if a major terrorist attack occurs using biological weapons of some sort? Will the health care system cope with the potentially large numbers of casualties reaching the public hospitals? In Australia, public hospitals in Sydney are struggling even to provide neo-natal care for new mothers. In a recent story of a Sydney woman on 7 May 2007, three hospitals had to transfer the woman who was on the verge of giving birth to twins until she reached a hospital in Wollongong where the facilities she needed were available. How can the public hospital system cope in the event of a terrorist attack?
A leading hospital administrator and chairman of the Department of Medicine at Sydney Hospital, John Graham, said Sydney hospitals are so cash-strapped, understaffed and so run down that if a terrorist attack would occur or a bird flu epidemic hit the city, the health system would not cope. It doesn't have the resources to look after 500,000 let alone the over 2 million people living in Sydney.
Dr Graham said:
"I am the canary down the coalmine and I am asphyxiating. It doesn't matter if I fall off my perch, but it matters if the heal-a-million who come into the Sydney CBD every day have their health jeopardised. I, for one, am not prepared to let the NSW Health Department sit back and do the wrong thing." (Snow, Deborah. Bioterrorism alert: hospital cutbacks leave city exposed: The Sydney Morning Herald. 22-23 April 2006, p.5.)
And this doesn't include the lack of commitment by the former Federal (Howard) Government as of 2006 to restrict advertising of junk food to children on television and elsewhere or at least force food giants to promote healthier foods. Because as childhood obesity gets worse, the burden on the public health system will increase.
People either take responsibility and look after everyone properly, or we all pay the consequences.
And yet another major contributing factor likely to overburdened the public health care system is the overuse of antibiotics to combat bacteria. The more humans use antibiotics, the more resistant the bacteria gets over time. And the less likely the health care system can copy with a large-scale epidemic of basic diseases.
Fortunately, encouraging signs are emerging in the world of science (and proves once again how important it is to invest in good quality scientific research and development no matter how radical and creative it might be seen by the State or Federal Governments of the day) where a new naturally-occurring substance has the power to revolutionise the antibiotic industry thanks to excellent work by Dr Jane Whitley of the Institute of Animal Science in Melbourne, with assistance from Dr Jianghui Wang and research team leader Dr Ben Cocks. It began when Dr Whitley came up with the brilliant idea of testing the anti-bacterial qualities of Tammar wallaby milk. As Dr Whitley said:
"When you look inside the mother's pouch, it's such a horribly dirty environment for the baby, and the mum if always poking about in there. It's not very hygienic.
'That's where the idea for the research project came from, because the milk seemed a logical place to look for something that would protect the joeys against infection.
'Their immune system doesn't develop for 100 days after they're born, and during that time they're relying totally on their mother's milk to fight any infection. It seemed pretty obvious that there had to be something in the milk." (Beeby, Rosslyn. Wallaby milk's curing quality uncovered in war against deadly superbugs: The Canberra Times. 29 April 2006, p.B2.)
As a result, Dr Whitley and her colleagues have realised there is a chemical in the milk (possibly AGG01) considered 100 times more powerful at fighting e-coli, salmonella and golden staph among many others than the strongest forms of penicillin.
Dr Whitley believes this is a classic example of creative thinking achieving a worthwhile goal for society. Dr Cocks has announced the news in late April 2006 at an international science conference in Chicago, USA. Funnily enough, the same announcement made in June 2005 by Victoria's Minister for Innovation John Brumby apparently didn't cause a stir in the scientific community or the media. It took a scientific conference to really get international scientists excited at the prospect.
This new discovery opens the door to testing the milk of other mammals such as platypus, possums and other marsupials.
Now if only we don't cause the extinction of all these animals and also protect the natural environment and maybe there could still be hope for humanity after all, and at the same time save the health care system.
The evidence of the population in economic systems not finding the time to be healthy
Social policy may have reached the crossroads. The increasing weight of people living a wealthy and sedentary lifestyle; less time away from work to exercise, eating healthy foods, and do a variety of different and more creative things for the mind and body; the convenience of buying low-cost and fast fat-filled take-away food with more sugar than you find at a Queensland sugar plantation; staying home after work and dropping on a couch in front of a TV or playstation; people wanting to become single because of pressures at work and the high cost of living; people dying alone in apartments; greater social isolation; more risky sexual practices; depression for L-brain people; increasing problems of childhood type 2 diabetes and so on is seeing some health professionals look towards a new social policy.
The solution is simple: all work and no play makes for a dull boy. The overemphasis on supporting the nation's economy and get filthy rich as emphasised by the Australian Federal (Howard) Government's new industrial relations reform is destroying the social fabric and health of Australian society.
It is time society reverses this trend.
UPDATE
2 January 2008
A survey of people living in Sydney in January 2008 has revealed obesity levels are highest among people with low incomes and less education in the Western suburbs than the higher affluent areas of the eastern and northern suburbs. Former NSW Premier Morris Lemma thinks the solution is encouraging people to get out more and exercise. Encouragement will not be enough. When people have less money, it takes longer to pay off the bills and mortgages. Consequently, people have to work longer hours earning very little money, or remain unemployed which at least provides extra time. By the time people get away from work, there is little time except feed the children and relax (ie. sleep). Is there anything more we can give to the people to help them find time to exercise
Then the Australian employers entered the debate claiming they were attempting to tackle the obesity problem of employees by paying people to exercise. Just throw more money at the problem and everything will be solved. It means employees must somehow fin time after work to exercise and then prove to the employers that they have done the exercises. How about giving something really substantial like letting employees work 4 days a week and the fifth day the employees prove they have visted a gym for at least half a day burning off those extra calories and eating healthy foods. And while we are at it, how about a health bar in the top floor to replace the boardroom so people can exercise going up the stairs for their vegetable juices and healthy bite-sized (not "eat like a horse" size) snacks.
As for the health funds, they are at least providing a small discount for people who take up a gym membership.
These are considered the easy option without sacrificing the economy or business profits.
What is the solution?
The above observations and evidence is suggesting the health system does need a new approach to health. If we do not make the effort to reform the health system, the quality of life for people will drop dramatically and people will die. R-wing commentators might think this is one way to reduce the human population (yet at the same time need lots of young consumers to maintain the economy, otherwise the other way is for another world war to start), but from a L-wing perspective it is heartless and lacking in compassion. Apart from this, the health system is a litmus test of where society is at and how well the people of that society are being looked after and coping with all the world problems of profits, population levels, the environment and many other areas. With that said, we already see a major crisis in the health care system within the current economic system. Why is it happening? Is this because there are power-hungry politicians who want to hide the money until election time? Or is there another reason?
On closer examination of the brief evidence, it suggests the health crisis is probably due to overpopulation because of limited resources by way of time, nurses and doctors, and what can be produced to help improve the health and well being of people in society. Feeding this view is how numerous governments seem to complain about not having enough money to fund the health care system. It certainly doesn't help for governments to hoard the money until election time. It makes no sense to do so. It will only make the governments not spending the money look like the cause for the problem. So instead, the lack of money is probably masking the real problem of overpopulation.
Of course all essential things needed to improve the health of people can be made. Unfortunately, there is a cost and it varies dramatically for certain things. True, it does help for people to have employment so long as they are paid adequately to afford the cost of good health. However, this is not always the case for everyone. And getting paid adequately is fast becoming the next major issue for most people (leaving aside the rich and powerful) with talk of relatively stagnant wage increases over the past 5 years. And if that is not enough, being employed and doing the work for someone else takes up too much free time and is often unrewarding that would otherwise create a happy disposition in people. As a consequence of this situation, people who are generally unhappy at work tend to search for rewards on their own through extra sleep, eating more (mostly junk) food, playing games on the computer, watching TV for long hours or whatever. All of which do not help to improve the health of people over the long term.
As far as the cost of getting certain things to help improve the health of the people, certain world governments are helping to take the financial edge off certain drugs through subsidies paid for by tax payers. This is essential.
Yet the talk of those working in the health system of struggling to find enough resources to help the large numbers of people needing their help as well as governments complaining about spending too much money on the health system is revealing a deeper issue.
There is a quiet sense among health professionals that suggest the government may not want to admit the population is way too high to support properly by the healthcare system. Supporting the current economy and providing any type of job and hopefully earning enough is felt to be sufficient to solve social problems such as our health.
This view is short-sighted.
It is interesting to note how when a R-wing government is in power, it has the remarkable ability to see health as a low priority (so it can save money), but yet it can significantly increase funding to Defence (as we have seen with the former Howard Government during the Iraq war, and the cycle repeats with the Trump Administration in the United States with efforts to dismantle Obama-care in the hope of saving money — but U.S. President Donald Trump was unsuccessful as of 24 March 2017) as if wanting to protect the rich and powerful (i.e. itself) who already have reasonable health (or can afford it) and maintain the ways of living in the economic system. It seems fighting terrorists or other battles of the day takes greater precedence for these people than looking after all the citizens of a country (and while we are at it, why not the health of all living things if we want to include the environment?).
It does make one wonder what would happen if all military spending was redirected towards improving health, education and the environment. Where would we be in 5 years time?
Other factors complicating the issue is how a number of businesses involved in the manufacturing of foods seem overly obsessed with profit. This is reflected in the way the businesses cut corners by producing cheap processed foods that are heavily laden with sugars, salt, fatty oils and over-baked with extra charcoal as a coating all in the name of better taste (and little nutritional value) and with it a high chance of selling the food products. Combined with the hectic lifestyle of people in employment too busy to look at the ingredients list of processed foods or to make their own foods at home using original raw and freshest ingredients, it probably exacerbates the health crisis even further.
And how can we ignore the problems of alcohol being sold by businesses for (yet again) profit resulting in people's lives being put at risk due to violence by drunken men. Hospitals often face the aftermath of such violence through numerous battered bodies ending up in emergency wards.
Clearly there has to be a better way
So what's the solution?
There are essentially three solutions available to us: (i) maintain the current economic system and allow any business to survive and thrive selling whatever they like to consumers and forever be forced to put more and more funding into health as population gets fatty and unhealthier, increases in number, and eventually get old (which means more people will have to work for longer with the retirement age raised to a higher level); (ii) be more efficient in how the health system is implemented; or (iii) undergo a radical and creative overhaul of the entire health and economic system.
At present the authorities have chosen (i) for R-wing governments, or (ii) with a little bit of (i) for L-wing governments. For the latter government, introducing some form of consumption tax targeting unhealthy foods would be on the cards. Perhaps we should call it the junk food tax? For R-wing governments, this is een as a bad idea.
Beyond that, governments are not exactly the brightest crayons in the pack. In other words, they are not noted for coming up with original and "creative" solutions despite decades of looking at the health care system. As Michael Fearnside, a neurosurgeon, said:
"The public system is just so swamped by emergencies now, it is just so difficult to get your elective patients in." (Pollard, Ruth. The Sydney Morning Herald: Radical surgery: Why hospitals face the knife. 10-11 December 2005, p.27 (pp.26-27).)
So what we have is either a combination of letting people do what they want and hopefully they can afford health care later (or else, just die for goodness sake according to most R-wing people), or develop a behaviour change through a new tax and/or apply the efficiency plan to the health system (a personal favourite for L-wing governments).
Speaking of efficiency plans, this will involve things like (i) reducing duplication in surgery work throughout all the major hospitals by having community health centres specialising in a particular field; (ii) having more nurses employed and performing more tasks commonly reserved to doctors; (iii) perform the right surgery to get people out of hospitals quickly; and (iv) promoting a better and more healthier lifestyle for everyone.
However if we are to truly tackle the health problem on a permanent basis then clearly the best solution has to be (iii). This will be more crucial as the population increases and no amount of efficiency will solve the problem (even using robots). It is time for a radical overhaul of every aspect of society, including our economy, and not just the health care system.
The creative approach would involve drastic changes in the following ways:
- All products sold by businesses must have a health benefit. No ifs or buts. Just healthy and nothing else. Sure, make it as tasty as possible, but never compromise on health in terms of nutritional value and ensuring people's health is improved and maintained through the right choice of natural ingredients. Any products identified by health professionals as "unhealthy" should be clearly marked for the consumers to see. Then the profits for the businesses that sell those products will go down and this will force them to innovate and improve the products to ensure it is healthy. Showing consumers what are unhealthy foods should not necessarily require showing gruesome images on the product labels of obese people (we see enough examples already just walking down the street) as occurs with cigarette packets. Rather, we inform and educate people to know why certain products are unhealthy. There must be good reasons for something being unhealthy. This would allow consumers to make informed decisions about which products to buy. For those products falling somewhere in between healthy and unhealthy, it is up to the businesses to find ingredients or other raw and natural materials to make their products fall into the healthy category. If they don't, they should be automatically classified as "unhealthy".
- Because of the potential increase in the cost of making healthy foods (why?), there must be incentives from others and subsidies from the government to reduce the cost. If necessary, introduce an unhealthy tax and divert the funds to making healthy food more affordable to the masses. This is especially true in the case where people will choose to buy "unhealthy" foods (because it tastes great and/or helps to overcome an emotional problem). They must pay a higher price through the introduction of a junk food tax (5). Revenue raised from the tax should be used to subsidise the cost of "healthy" foods. The more people who choose to buy "unhealthy" foods, the cheaper "healthy" foods become.
- To show businesses are not obsessed with profits, prove it by making healthy foods. As further evidence, allow employees more free time away from work to do different things. Either give employees special gym memberships, or discount vouchers to use at a health food shop when purchasing healthy products. All business professionals should encourage all employees to use these options on a daily basis. Or pay people to go to gyms for exercises or give one day off to do it (i.e. work for 4 days, pay for 5 or some other reward system, and the work productivity and a happier workforce will go up to compensate).
- Improve the environment as a sign that people can see society as a whole does care for its citizens and all living things on this planet. This will encourage people to look after themselves by improving their own health when they see everything else the same.
- Control the size of the human population supporting the economic system so that all public services can easily support the existing population of a given region under any situation, emergency or not, and the people working in these services are happy enough to do so without stress. Free condoms? Have a national "safe sex using condoms" day to help teach the importance of contraception in our sexual activities? It doesn't matter. Anything that will teach people to be balanced and reasonable in the number of people they may wish to introduce into the world. One child is ideal. Two is okay (at least it will replace the parents). Any more than this is irresponsible, even if the family can afford to support all the children.
- If governments are more concerned about maintaining the economic system, then stop the wars by properly negotiating with the terrorists and working with foreign leaders to find long-term and peaceful solutions. It is a waste of money fighting wars when the resources could be used to help people of all nations to improve their health and achieve more worthwhile and peaceful solutions for everyone.
- As the population ages, doctors should be allowed to give a fair assessment on the likelihood of patients to survive any surgery if a health problem develops. If the patient chooses to take the risk, then give them the best medical care available. But if patients are happy that they have lived a long life and don't want to go on and there is clearly very little prospect of surviving for much longer, allow doctors to assist patients to consider euthanasia as a dignified way to move on. It is no point in us being selfish in trying to survive as long as possible even if the probability of survival is less than 5 per cent. If you had a good long life, consider whether such resources could be used to assist someone else who has a better chance of survival (and hopefully be contributing to society to make it better).
- Society needs to look at death in a positive way as not the end, but rather the beginning to a new life. For those who know they are nearing the end of their lives, some means of teaching this bigger picture about this universe as well as way of streamlining the process of moving on to the next life and ensuring no pain is felt should form the backbone of a truly compassionate society.
- In extreme population overload situations, doctors need to make harsh decisions about who will survive a treatment and who will not. Doctors who see certain patients not following a healthy lifestyle and choose to ontinue to maintain the lifestyle even after being told the treatment will not help without a radical change in the patients' lifestyle, the priority for providing medical treatment should be given to those patients who do try to do the right thing.
- Give adequate and substantial rewards to people who do the right thing to improve their health. For example, reduce costs for doctor's visits, lower private health insurance, lower or eliminate gym fees, provide significant discounts on sports clothing, and even further discounts on purchasing healthy products. Rewards are what will definitely change behaviour more quickly and effectively and for the better than any other method known to humankind.
Let's face it. Our population is growing and growing fast and there are people wanting to sell unhealthy products for the sake of becoming rich. At the same time, everyone must stay alive and find ways to earn a living and pay for the costs of food as well as time to do the right thing. Unless we are prepared to train everyone to become their own doctors and nurses (let's leave the bedroom scene out of it for a moment) and have the skills to create their own medicine and perhaps perform their own surgeries to solve personal health problems, the increasing age and population levels of those people more concerned about getting rich and having what they want, or having little time to help themselves, is putting considerable stress on the public health care system. If it is for any reason not apparent now then certainly in the next 20 years it will. You think the governments are complaining about how much the health care systems costs today. Just wait in the next 20 years. It will multiple even further, and government may choose to suddenly keep quiet as not to alarm the public of the crisis. When this happens, we know there is a crisis.
And what then? Will governments pay robots to become the most highly efficient doctors and nurses in the world to help reduce costs? Certainly beats having to pay health care professionals a salary given how expensive the health care system is now getting for most governments.
There must be a limit to how much efficiency you can achieve. It is time for a radical overhaul of the entire system of society and the economy, and not just in the health sector. And it is better to do it now, not in 20 years time.
Let the new radical health care system place the onus for good health squarely at the individual. Let them make the right choices and reward them through a lower price for healthy products (it will solve the problem of the poor not being able to afford things and achieve greater health even if the education is not there yet), more information presented in a simplified way to show why certain products are unhealthy (and give businesses the opportunity to improve the products quickly), and, if necessary, pay people or give them extra time and other rewards for doing the right thing.
Sure, the radical change is tough for those who deliberately abuse their bodies and mind irrespective of the advice medical professionals provide them. Perhaps people do it because they want to be rich and/or enjoy life's pleasures, which is understandable in a modern life seen by many as stressful and somewhat unemotional. But if a person was told by a doctor that smoking will damage his/her lungs and yet fails to adhere to the advice and change their lifestyle, then treatment to repair (or replace) the damaged lungs at some point in the future should be curtailed and the resources applied to other people who are willing to do the right thing.
Sure, this will require doctors, the legal profession, and businesses to accept death as a natural medical solution under the new radical health care system just as much as saving people's lives is. Unfortunately there is not much choice in a society that is overpopulated.
There are religious types who disagree with this view such as the conservative Christian-based Australian Liberal Party under the leadership of John Howard, or other politicians. However, if religious people are so pro-life, why did the Howard Government pay so little to carers to look after everyone until the age of their natural death? Is this to try hastening death when carers cannot receive the money to afford helping the people under their care or to look after themselves? According to Pontifical Council for Pastoral Assistance, Charter for Health Care Workers, No.149, 1994:
"The sick person who feels surrounded by a loving human and Christian presence does not give way to depression and anguish as would be the case if one were left to suffer and die alone and wanting to be done with life. This is why euthanasia is a defeat for the one who proposes it, decides it and carries it out."
Does this mean carers should be Christians in order to live on very little income from the Government and just pray in their local Churches for a solution?
But what about the non-Christians who do the right thing by looking after the elderly people? A number of them do not receive any additional support from the community.
Pro-life supporters, including the R-wing Christian-based government, should back up what they believe by paying people adequately to look after other people, including those in palliative care, or else accept death as a natural medical solution and an option for patients to choose if they so wish. Sure, you can have the attitude that Bruce Lee had when he said:
Yet even he understood that at some point we will all have to let go. We must let God or the Universe take care of us, restore balance, and see what our new adventure will be like in the next life. As some people would say:
"You also need to know when to bow out of the stage of life, with grace and dignity and be ready to face a new life beyond what we know."
Don't try to be like those bad guys from the Dark Side of the Force in Star Wars where the obsession among the leaders is to live forever and often end up replacing their failing biological body parts with robotics until they become almost entirely machine (except for their brains). Science cannot achieve this as yet. And even if we could, we do not have the knowledge to know how to love properly and maintain balance all the time. Our attitude when we think we are invincible somehow changes to something that involves unspeakable power and dominance in the galaxy. That is not love by any stretch of the imagination. Sure, you can extend your life by any reasonable means, but accept that it is inevitable that we must all die at some point in our lives. This is what restores the imbalances in our thoughts, our beliefs, and our actions in the environment and other life forms. We don't know how to balance ourselves, so our knowledge for true immortality is beyond us. We do not know how to properly love, so we try, and we learn the best we can, and then we must be content with ourselves and the lives we have led because the experience of death will come for all of us. That is the nature of life.
We need to remember, medical science already has the knowledge and the technology to stop the pain, allowing people to die peacefully. Death can be most dignified with no pain involved whatsoever when in the hands of compassionate and caring health professionals rather than letting nature (or God) do the job which we hope will be nothing more than as peaceful as falling asleep if we look after our health, but could easily be a whole lot more painful, violent and/or take longer especially if we don't look after our health (e.g. obesity leads to sudden heart attacks as one example). True, some people trained in the art of meditation can overcome pain to the point where it is possible to reach the moment of death. But not everyone is an expert in this field and there isn't time for enough people to learn. We have to be sensitive to the pain of others so we can act out of love the correct way to help these people.
What makes it really bizarre is how society is prepared to send older people to 15 years jail to stop them importing illegal drugs that could end their lives in a dignified way such as Nebutal. But here's the irony: looking after someone in prison costs around $30,000 per year. Carers in the community are lucky to receive a fraction of this amount. In fact, most carers provide their services for free often at the detriment of their own health and surviving frugally with the person they are caring for at home. If society is truly prepared to send older people to prison because this is what the law says just to stop them from ending their lives, why can't every carer get paid a salary of $30,000 per year or more (and should be on top of whatever they can earn from other jobs) to look after older people?
Caring for people should be more important than trying to support a broken economy system.
If we can't value carers enough to look after other people properly by paying them for what they are genuinely worth in terms of the economic savings they are providing to the Governments of the day, it has to be a sad indictment of the state of society today and of the R-wing religious types who believe in pro-life, but ask people to do miracles for others using nothing or somehow find the money to pay for it all.
Let's look at this from a more religious point-of-view since a lot of well-off people in Western society tend to rely on religion to support their position.
God is meant to be loving, is he/she not?
When we look after ourselves and others, we hope God will be kind to us throughout life and at some point will let us die peacefully in our sleep. However at other times, whether through cancer or some genetic reason causing us to become obese or whatever, we may not have this luxury. We will experience considerable pain. Why should people continue to suffer because of it? It is like the very rare condition seen in some people where a portion of the brain has been wired the wrong way causing the person to think, say, a healthy part of his/her leg is a cancerous object and needs to be removed, and then he/she tries to freeze it off. We all think this is silly and we refuse to treat the person. Since there is nothing we can do to the brain to make it think differently we tend to ignore it. But the person suffering the condition will eventually make the decision himself by dunking his leg into a bucket of ice to freeze his leg off and then doctors will have to amputate the affected limb as the only solution.
When it comes to death, the same kind of thinking will occur for people who experience extreme pain and the realisation that life is coming to an end. You can't stop them when the decision is made. So why ignore the option of euthanasia by pretending to treat the person and think praying or other means will improve the health in order to keep him/her alive for as long as possible? We all like to believe in miracles. Yet if the facts are clear and we know death is imminent, why prolong the anguish? Let the person decide it is time to pass through the experience of death to whatever is on the other side (which is most likely to start a new life). We have the technology to make it happen in a painless and totally dignified way. All we need is the love of society to support the individual in his/her own final decision.
Incredibly we do it for our family pets without a word of disapproval from the religious types because somehow we all know it is a form of love. We don't want our pets to suffer, so why not do the same for people? What makes people more special that our family pets and all other living things?
If love means letting people have their wish to die as there is nothing we can do to help them, then do it. Or else get the priorities right by spending money on helping carers look after everyone else instead of on defence and other useless activities.
Hence in the new radical health care system, if we are genuine about the concept of love that we can allow people to decide how they wish to end their lives, then politicians — dare we say it, the R-wing Christian types as well — will have to legislate that individuals facing the new radical health care system should be allowed to legally enforce any decision they make to ensure one's health is maintained and, if that is not possible, how they wish to die. If necessary, it should be legally written down somewhere to ensure the bitter debate between the traditional religious types and other people over a particular individual's medical condition such as what has occurred with Ms Terri Schiavo in the US in early 2005 don't rage on and divide society as it has done.
In fact, by writing things down, you should not have to go through the suffering of starving to death as was the case with Mr Schiavo just because the legal system says any assistance by the hand of a compassionate doctor to shorten the life is an act of killing and traditional religious types say this is not God's will. And you also don't have people around Mr Schiavo suffer too while he potentially suffers until death (if he partially wakes and feels the pain).
If you decide certain medical conditions are so serious that the probability of survival is extremely remote and there is nothing society can do to help you (and even religious types with their faith can't be sure God can help you either), a truly compassionate and loving society should be prepared to respect your wishes to die peacefully, painlessly and quickly without being forced to die a potentially long, painful and lingering death through the natural process because of a legal requirement or the view of certain religious types that it isn't "right". (6)
It is like trying to tell Jesus Christ not to die on the cross 2,000 years ago. Why? What makes us more important to deny the wishes of another individual. In fact, in many cases, you can't even control the situation. People will eventually choose the time and place of their death if they want to end it all. In the case of Jesus, he made his own decision. Call it foolish, or brave. But if he wants to make a point about the nature of death to other people, who are we to stop him? The man can choose whatever he wishes for his own life. And we learn he did choose after telling Judas it is okay to betray him so he can make his extraordinary point about the nature of this Universe and death itself. In fact, it would appear Judas was really a hero rather than the villain. And Jesus understood there was nothing his people could do to change it. Not even the Roman occupation and the power of the Jewish elite of religious leaders could stop it. If Jesus chooses, he can and he will. Perhaps his lesson is has final legacy for mankind.
So how is this any different for the people living today?
Employers may decide how people should work and make a profit, governments may decide how people should pay their taxes, and traditional religious people may decide what is ethically the right thing to do for others in the eyes of their own God in which they understand it (including right to life etc), so why not let the people themselves decide what they wish to do with their own lives? People must ultimately decide for themselves based on their own circumstances and understanding of God and what is possible in today's society how they wish to live and how they wish to die. You can only give so much advice. In the end, people will decide what they want and it is up to us to respect those wishes as a form of love.
As others would say, do not interfere in the affairs of others.
The health issue has now become far too important for society to let employers, governments, and traditional R-wing religious types decide the future direction of everyone else in society through their focus on money, power or what some people think is ethical in the eyes of their own God all the time. Employers and all the individuals comprising our hopefully forward-thinking society must take responsibility to ensure themselves and everyone else are allowed to make their own decision about how to be healthy and fit or, when the time comes, how to die. Because a healthy individual (and a person that knows he/she is healthy without burdening the health care system) is a healthy society.
And a healthy society is truly the lowest cost and happiest society in the world.
Only then, when the individual and society are healthy and when the population is properly capped and made sustainable once again, can we afford to look after the health of everyone no matter what we do in this universe.