LEILA MCKINNON, HOST: What's being done to fix the rural health crisis? Where do we find these doctors that are so desperately needed? Well, earlier, I spoke to Federal Health Minister Mark Butler. Minister, thanks very much for your time. We've just seen people in regional areas are suffering. They say they feel like they're living in a Third World country. Can you honestly say that you're proud of Australia's health system?
MINISTER FOR HEALTH AND AGED CARE, MARK BUTLER: Australia does have one of the world's best health care systems, but we know it's always been tougher outside of the big cities to get access to a doctor, to good hospital care and to bulk billing and things like that. That frankly has become harder over the last several years.
MCKINNON: There's an urgency here, isn't there? People are dying younger in the country. They're dying of things that are preventable. Are you moving quickly enough? And what's being done right now to make a difference?
BUTLER: I recognise it's really tough, particularly in rural communities, to get access to a doctor right now. We're getting more doctors into the system. We've had more doctors into the system over the last 2 years than any time in the past decade. We're getting more bulk billing into the system, and the biggest increases in bulk billing has been in regional communities, because that's where our investment has been largest. We're putting in place Urgent Care Clinics across the country, including in regional communities as well.
Now, this is not happening as fast as any of us would like. We're trying to find ways of getting overseas trained doctors into the system quicker – from the UK, from Ireland, New Zealand in particular. There used to be a lot of red tape. I've cut that red tape significantly, reduced the fees, and already we have a lot more interest from those countries to come here. I do also want to see Australian graduates working in the country. We know if they train outside of our major cities, they're more likely to stay working, building a life, building a career and a family in rural communities as well. We've been working with universities in particular, to establish more medical school training in rural communities, and that's starting to take effect. We have to start now, 5 or 8 years ago would have been the best time, but we didn't start then. So, we have to start now.
MCKINNON: In 20 years time, it's projected Australia will be short more than 11,000 GPs. How confident are you that these measures you're talking about will halt that slide? Because that's a landslide.
BUTLER: It's really quite a terrifying number. Thirty or 40 years ago, half of all medical graduates went into general practice. Now it's only about 1 in 7. So, we really are having real difficulty replacing that generation of hardworking GPs who are in the process of retiring now. We're going to have to train more. There's no question about that. What we've been doing has been making a real difference, whether it's more doctors, more bulk billing or more urgent care.
MCKINNON: We have just seen a heartbreaking story of people who can't get medical care now. They can't see a doctor. Is there anything that can be done for them because it's heartbreaking to watch?
BUTLER: I's truly heartbreaking. So many of those communities have relied upon this one or two GPs for decades. They've built their lives there. They've given service to those communities literally for decades. When they go, there's this enormous vacuum in that community that we need to help fill. We've done that in a couple of communities over the last few weeks in Queensland, where we've been able to deploy our GP incentive fund to get some GPs in to replace one of those longstanding GPs who have retired. But during that gap, it's just so distressing for people not to have the confidence and the security that around the corner there's the ability to go and see a doctor. We're doing everything we can to fill those gaps.
MCKINNON: Well, Christmas is coming fast, but so is the federal election. What have you got to say to convince voters that you have this crisis under control?
BUTLER: We've delivered more doctors and more bulk billing, and we're delivering more Urgent Care Clinics, as well as cheaper medicines. This is making a real difference to people in the community. But I know it's still really tough to find accessible, affordable health care and I know we need to do more to keep strengthening Medicare.
MCKINNON: Well, we all hope you can solve this, Minister. Lives depend on it. Thank you.
BUTLER: Thanks, Leila.