Mark Butler (Hindmarsh, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Health and Aged Care) Share this | Hansard source

I'm delighted to take that question from our friend the member for Canberra. I'm also delighted to report, after our visit to a general practice this morning, that she has excellent blood pressure, which is often very difficult in this line of work we are in. She also promised her constituents at the last election that we would deliver cheaper medicines, and that is exactly what we are doing. In just 12 months we have delivered three different waves of cheaper medicine reform, which is already saving Australian patients tens and tens of millions of dollars, and we're working hard as well to list new cutting-edge treatments on the PBS so Australian patients get access to the world's best medicines—they're coming on right now—at affordable prices. Last month, for example, we listed a medicine called Kerendia, a new treatment for diabetic kidney disease. Now 26,000 Australians will have access to this life-changing treatment at no more than $30 a script—$7 a script if they're concessional payments; $30 a script otherwise—instead of paying a thousand dollars per year to have access to this relief.

As the member for Canberra intimates, we want to do more. We are determined to make medicines even cheaper, which is why we accepted the advice of the medicines experts who manage the PBS to allow doctors to issue 60-day prescriptions for ongoing health conditions at the price of a 30-day script. It is a policy that just makes sense. It saves patients time and money, halving the price of common medicines for six million patients. It frees up millions of desperately needed GP consults for much more serious complex health conditions, and it improves medication compliance. We know that from evidence overseas. This is why so many other countries already do this, and that is why pretty much every patients' group and every doctors' group in the country supports our policy.

An honourable member interj ecting—

I hear the interjection: what would a doctor's group know about health policy? What doesn't make sense is why the coalition seems so determined to block access to cheaper medicines for six million Australians. What doesn't make sense is why the coalition government, when they received the same advice five years ago, chose not to implement it.

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