Monique Ryan (Kooyong, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you!—and how pleasant it has been, over the last couple of days, to hear from so many people with a medical professional background, like the members for Dobell, Robertson, Cooper and Mackellar—pharmacists, nurses, doctors—about how strongly we feel about our PBS and its value in this country.

But I have to say that medicine affordability matters to all Australians, not just to those of us who have been involved in the healthcare sector. In 2020-21, almost two-thirds of us needed at least one PBS medication. In total, 314 million prescriptions were dispensed under the PBS or the RPBS.

This bill will reduce the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme general patient charge from $42.50 to $30, indexed annually. Three point six million Australians with current scripts costing more than $30 will immediately save money as a result of this bill.

The PBS is a vital part of our medical system. It ensures that Australians have timely, reliable and affordable access to safe medicines. It keeps otherwise overly expensive medications affordable.

This move to decrease the co-payment for medication is a significant one. It is the first time in the 75-year history of the PBS that that co-payment has been cut.

It's worth remembering, though, that this bill only applies to the more expensive medications, and for a subgroup of Australians. It will primarily benefit people who do not purchase a substantial amount of PBS medications each year and so do not hit the safety net threshold, and those who do not qualify for concession cards. The bill does not affect the safety net threshold or the concessional co-payment amount.

According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, in 2019-2020 nearly 900,000 Australians delayed having prescriptions filled or did not have them filled at all due to the cost of those medications. People who need to pick and choose which script they will fill and which one they will defer are potentially risking their health. They are also potentially having to put up with loss of function and with pain. Parents shouldn't have to choose between getting the medication that they need and putting food on the table for their families.

I also note that we know that many PBS medications costing less than $30 per script will increase in cost after 1 October. This results from agreements made by the previous government with manufacturers to increase the cost of almost 1,000 medications. This happened during the COVID pandemic in mid-2021 as a result of the minimum stock holding requirements strategic agreement. But the fact remains that a $20 or $25 script is not a minor consideration for many Australian families. We need our government to advocate effectively on our behalf to secure medications as inexpensively as possible for this hugely important scheme.

Finally, I would like to note that we need our government to promote best-practice prescribing. In March 2022 the Morrison government defunded the NPS MedicineWise scheme. NPS MedicineWise is a 24-year-old scheme providing national leadership, education and resources on the best-practice use of medications and medication safety in Australia. Its programs and resources reach all GPs. They reach one-third of residential aged-care facilities across Australia. The program has made significant improvements to the health of Australians by reducing medication errors and decreasing overprescription. Its importance has been highlighted in the reports from the aged-care commission on the safety of medications and the frequency of medication errors in aged-care facilities.

With the Albanese government Minister Butler had the chance to reverse the decision to cancel the NPS MedicineWise scheme, but he chose not to do so. I believe the Albanese government has erred in not reversing the decision to cancel the NPS MedicineWise program. Proposals to transfer its activities to the Australian Commission on Safety and Quality in Health Care or to competitive grant processes are undeveloped and relatively underfunded. Given that the government spends $14 billion a year on the PBS, the $24 million a year spent on the NPS is a pittance, especially given that this program has delivered a net return on investment of more than two to one to the federal government by delivering more than $1.1 billion in direct savings for the PBS and NPS—improvements like a 25 per cent decrease in the overprescription of some antibiotics, prevention of 50,000 unnecessary scans for low back pain, and half a million fewer scripts for opioids, saving us more than $9 billion. The health of the Australian people and our budget bottom line will only be improved by ongoing support from our government for consumer education programs which improve health literacy.

This bill provides the targeted healthcare intervention that we need to help those most in need of assistance with cost-of-living pressures. To further improve our health system we need to optimise our use of prescription medications and to improve our healthcare outcomes. I call on the Albanese government to reverse its decision to withdraw support for the NPS MedicineWise program.

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