Ann Sudmalis (Gilmore, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise today to talk about constant glucose monitoring devices, which have now been funded by the government and subsidised for type I diabetes for children under the age of 21. Two years ago I met Donna Meads-Barlowe. She had started up a program of advocating for these constant glucose monitoring devices because she had lost her 17-year-old daughter Danii. Just before she was due to do her Higher School Certificate, she was dead in bed from a hypoglycaemic episode. This absolutely tore me apart. Then I found out there were parents with children with type I diabetes in my region—Brad with his daughter India, Julie with her daughter Brianna and Pieta with her son Caleb—and that they lived with this fear every day. They had to get up at night to check on the sugar levels of their children. A couple of them are firefighters. If they were out, they had no way of knowing that the grandparents could cope with the problems that their children were going through.

This device has become life-changing. For two years I lobbied two different health ministers, saying, 'We need to put funds aside for this constant glucose monitoring device.' This is life-changing. This means that parents can go to bed after checking their children just after they have read them a story and know their children will be alive the next morning. This is a game changer for these people.

Margaret, from my region, wrote to me and said: 'Anne, thank you so much for all the work that you've done. I'm really happy with that. But, you know what? You've got more to do. It's not good enough just to have these devices available for people up to the age of 21. The complications that people can endure after that age are pregnancy complications, health issues where bones won't mend as quickly, kidney failure—there are a whole stack of complications. Can you please, please work with the Prime Minister and the health minister and get funding for type 1 diabetic adults to also have access to this constant glucose monitoring device?'

Well, I worked pretty hard for a long, long time in order to get the pensioner concession cards back. Just before the budget, I was thinking, 'Well, I'm not sure that worked.' Well, it did. Being a constant nuisance to the minister at the time worked. Let me tell you, Margaret—and let me tell all the other type 1 diabetes sufferers in my region and the rest of Australia—I will also lobby and advocate to get this device subsidised for adults. If we can get these trials with the young people and we can ascertain a better result, a better quality of life for you, then hopefully we can extend this to every other type 1 diabetic in Australia and make all your lives just that much more worthwhile, because, do you know what? You are worth fighting for.

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