Health System Under Threat
Illawarra Mercury
Monday May 5, 2003
THE crisis facing Australian medical indemnity laws was a greater immediate threat to the health system than proposed changes to Medicare, a rally in Melbourne heard yesterday.
More than 500 doctors spilled out of an indoor Australian Medical Association (AMA) rally in Melbourne's city centre, protesting against impending changes to medical insurance laws.
New federal medical indemnity legislation from July 1 includes capped $15 million damages cover and does not insure doctors who retire after that date.
Parents of sick and disabled children opposing the changes gathered outside the indoor rally at the Hotel Sofitel, carrying banners reading ``It may cost doctors money, but it costs us a lifetime" and ``Where's your duty of care?"
Australian Medical Association (AMA) president Kerryn Phelps told the rally changes to be introduced on July 1 by the Federal Government would throw the health system into chaos.
She said medical premiums would soar and doctors' claims would be capped at $15 million for one year, leaving specialists and GPs with no choice but to retire, stop using life-saving and life-enhancing procedures or look for work overseas.
Women's health would be the worst hit, with a survey revealing 40 per cent of obstetricians would quit on June 30 if the legislation was not changed, she said.
``The Medicare reform package and the health agreement are totally meaningless if there are no doctors around," Dr Phelps told the rally.
``The immediate health priority is to fix medical indemnity.
``If the Government doesn't act and act fast, it will be all to late."
The mother of a disabled child, Cristy Lea, whose four-year-old son Connor has cerebral palsy, said she supported the doctors' cause and felt that if an obstetrician had been present during her son's birth it might have ``made a difference".
Victorian Opposition health spokesman David Davis said the interim results of a Liberal Party survey of 94 Victorian doctors showed many would leave or modify their practices after June 30.
© 2003 Illawarra Mercury
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