Aedo you need to go back to the beginning of the thread to understand waht we're talking about. My beef is with COMPULSORY health insurance that is levied on people who have no access to private services - refer Pap's post. And yes, these people would be better off paying directly through tax since the government is the ONLY service provider available to them. That's the issue. NO argument with private practitioners, or those who choose that route.
Same issue with mining. That's why we have FIFO and mining camps OK - I'm not about to trawl through 58 pages to find you original beef - but as this thread is generally to take the piss out of our current political leader I'm not sure it is even relevant... but makes for a good discussion And just to continue to be irritating... it isn't actually compulsory Also the ease of getting to a major centre for elective work means that private health insurance is still a valid consideration even if you live in Isa (unplanned/emergency medical support is alway govt anyway). This is your key point and as I pointed out before it is incorrect. If you pay the medical levy through tax much less goes into health than if you pay a similar (or even slightly less) amount into private health insurance whether you use it or not. This means that if you pay private health insurance more funds are available overall to the health system and therefore more govt funding can reach remote areas.
NO, you are quite wrong - the money you pay to private health insurance goes to the INSURANCE company. If you don't make a claim, they pay out nothing and NOTHING goes to the service providers. Your premium does NOT go into the health system! All private health insurance does is INSURE YOU against personally having to pay out bigger amounts. As I've said before, I have no argument with those who choose to pay for private cover but this dumb idea that you're contributing to the system drives me crazy!!!! The social benefit that private services provide to the general public is the 'load shifting' of moving people off the (overloaded) public system and into the private system BUT this benefit does not exist where there is no private option. And no the primary purpose of this discussion was not to 'take the piss' - in fact it's to try and get people to use their brains and think about the sh** that's shovelled through government and media at us! It actually started as a discussion of poorly planned / implemented government policy.
And most galling of all... because of the deal done by the government to 'subsidise' 30% of premiums, on top of Pap's $4500, the taxpayers of Australia have given another $1928 to his insurance company! Anybody want to explain how that $6428 would not have been better spent at Mt Isa hospital?????? On a side note - would anyone (qualified) like to comment on whether there is any difference between the 'scheduled fee' paid to practitioners by private insurance vs Medicare? And similarly (although I realise this is very hard to quantify) - what percentage of private patient lists would revert to public IF the private insurance incentives were removed; given that many people like myself would simply pay up or self-insure?
You're driving me nuts! Do you truly not understand how insurance works? Insurance companies pay out to various health sector parties a significant proportion of the funds they receive. You may not personally benefit but that is not the point - insurance companies don't keep all of your premium as profit if you don't make a claim - they spend it covering costs of other claim (and as it is a very competitive industry their profits are modest).
:sigh: we went through this before. Nicole (hope you don't mind me referring to you guys Pap, feel free to delete) was admitted to a PUBLIC hospital as a PRIVATE patient. That means the health fund PAID money to the PUBLIC hospital for use of the bed AND consumables etc AND paid the health provider for their services. They received direct attention from a specialist rather than have the course of the pregnancy followed by a midwife. THAT is the purpose of taking out insurance in this case. The actual bill would have been higher than what Pap paid. As for whether the money should go straight to Mt Isa Hospital, well that depends on your ideological viewpoint. In my experience, NO, public departments have virtually zero accountability and are extremely poor money managers Doctors set their own fees. They can choose to charge the Medicare Benefit Schedule or not. If you are an outpatient and your GP charges the schedule fee, Medicare will refund 100%, if you see a specialist 85%. If you are an inpatient Medicare will pay 75% and the amount the insurer will pay for the "gap" depends on your policy. The MBS in some/most instances does not reflect the actual cost of the service and has changed very little over the last 10 years. eg the MBS fee for a pelvic ultrasound is $60. This is a half hour procedure. If we bulk bill the patient, Medicare will pay $57. The sono techs are on around $60/hr, so that leaves $27 to cover machine costs, room lease etc. We lose money on every bulk billed pelvic ultrasound. I can't see how a bulk billing practice in a remote area would survive No idea, but here are some figure re what happened around the time incentives were introduced Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
Timely specs out today from the Cairns branch of RFDS,which goes as far as Torres Strait and west to the Gulf. Patients transported:953,including 479 primary evacuations(1.25 per day,the rest were inter-hospital transfers), Distance flown:1,428,646 Klm,with a total of 4197 landings and 4656 hours. Health clinics:2871,including GP, family,womens and mental health. Patient consultations:28417,including 2554 immunisations,7462 remote radio consultations. ...and that's just the Cairns branch,in Queensland the total number of transportations were 10,316. Yep,they'd be completely up the creek without you.Thank you.
Yes Greg in the case of a CLAIM, money gets paid to the public hospital but many people (such as Aedo) seem to think all their PREMIUMS go the health system - that's the bit I'm complaining about. I've never said anything about getting rid of private insurance, all I've been arguing is that it is inequitable to force people into a coverage where they have little opportunity for making any claim, and if they make no claims, none of the money makes it into the system and the government has paid money to an insurer, rather than the health service. I agree the Medicare sheduled fees are often way short of realistic and need to be increased; just wondering if private insurers value the services any more accurately? I also have no problem with professionals charging a market rate and users paying the gap. I would probably be happy to see bulk-billing limited to Benefits recipients, with everyone else paying market rates. Incidentally, what happened in Coolum was the local doctors stopped bulk-billing (this was a while ago when the rates had really got below par) but then a new medical centre opened advertising bulk-billing and by market force, everyone was back to bulkbilling. Not necessarily the best outcome... The question about patient lists was not about who has insurance, but rather what proportion of patients would not use your service if they didn't have private insurance?
That doesn't make sense to me. It would be interesting to see what margin these insurance companies have. I suspect that MOST of the premium would go to the paying for health care (after costs) But...that's just a guess. I'm guessing margins are tight.
Well of course some of it ends up as profit, what is wrong with that? The alternative is that it gets pumped into an inefficient bureaucracy and goes down the drain instead. And I don't think Aedo made any such inference. You're implying if you don't make a claim then the money put in by you is not utilized. That is simply not true. The average claim for a hospital stay is much higher than the yearly contributions, so where does that extra come from? Private insurers do not value a service. Have a look at the government website on private health insurance I posted earlier. With regards to my own practice it would make ZERO difference if the % of privately insured patients dropped as private health insurers DO NOT cover any radiological procedures for outpatients.
Yes Good guess "Private health insurers in Australia generally operate with modest profit margins. Gross margin is the difference between total contribution income and total cost of benefits, which include state levies. Net margin is equal to the gross margin less management expenses. The net margin is sometimes referred to as the underwriting margin. The industry weighed average net margin is forecast at 4.23% for the 12 months to 31 March 2013. Within the industry, net margins are forecast to be on average higher for larger insurers and also for-profit insurers. For the 12 months to 31 March 2013, larger insurers are forecasting average net margins of 4.46%, compared with the 3.42% forecast by smaller insurers. For-profit insurers are forecasting average net margins of 5.11%, while not-for-profit insurers are forecasting 2.43%. " http://www.health.gov.au/internet/main/publishing.nsf/Content/privatehealth-summary-premiumincreases
Interesting http://www.news.com.au/national/medibank-releases-list-of-top-ten-most-expensive-health-fund-in-2012/story-fncynjr2-1226545092088
Wait.....so the elderly cost more to keep healthy than young people? What a revelation! LOL There are a couple if big bills alright.
You goose, it's the big bills that are interesting. That's why you can't save and pay for this yourself as others on here imply. There are always unforeseen events. The guy that went in for the prostate surgery obviously developed some sort of complication, eg cardiac failure that necessitated a looooong stay in ICU = $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$. And you guys think a Ferrari engine build is expensive , lol