Meryl Swanson (Paterson, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Defence) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

s SWANSON () (): A new public hospital will open in my electorate of Paterson next year—the new Maitland Hospital—thanks to our brilliant community, which stood shoulder to shoulder with Jenny Aitchison, the state member for Maitland, and I as we ensured that it was a state owned and public hospital that we got. It's going to be equipped with a brand-new, state-of-the-art MRI scanner, which is fantastic news. But that scanner does not have a full Medicare licence, which means, for people who are not inpatients at the hospital, that MRI scans will be expensive—very expensive.

MRI technology is amazing, and health professionals are using MRIs more and more to detect, diagnose and treat cancers, heart disease and serious injury. MRIs provide a wealth of medical information that other scans can't without the added concern of exposure to radiation. But they cost between $500 and $1,500, and many people in my electorate are going without groceries for the week or the fortnight just to afford an MRI. People who need them can be out of pocket hundreds of dollars if the MRI they go to does not have a full Medicare licence. Only Mr Hunt, the health minister, can provide this licence. I say to him: open up the licence and give us one for the new Maitland Hospital.