Almost $7,500 per person was spent on health goods and services in Australia during 2017-18, totaling more than $185 billion nationally.
A new report by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW), launched at the Australian Health Economics Society Conference in Melbourne and titled Health expenditure in Australia 2017-18, found total health spending increased by $2.2 billion in 2017-18 to $185.4 billion in constant prices.
“This was a 1.2 per cent increase on 2016-17 against a backdrop of 3.9 per cent average annual growth over the decade,” said the AIHW’s Dr Adrian Webster.
“The lower growth rate in 2017-18 was partly due to the previous year having included one-off capital expenditure on projects such as the new Royal Adelaide Hospital. It was also a result of a previous spike in Australian Government spending on new drugs to treat hepatitis C.
“Governments funded two-thirds ($126.7 billion) of total health spending in 2017-18, with the Australian Government contributing $77.1 billion – $1.8 billion more than the previous year.”
State and Territory governments spent $49.5 billion – $1.3 billion less than the previous year.
“Health expenditure by governments represented 24.4 per cent of tax revenue, a decline from 2016-17 where 26 per cent of tax revenue was spent on health,” Dr Webster said.
“The decline in health expenditure as a proportion of tax revenue was primarily due to relatively rapid revenue growth when compared with previous years.”
In 2017-18, personal out-of-pocket health costs amounted to an average of $1,578 per person. There was little change in the proportion of individual net worth spent on health over the decade.
Contributions to health spending by private health insurers rose by $400 million to $16.6 billion in 2017-18.
“The decade has seen an overall increase in spending by private health insurance providers per person covered. In 2017-18, private health insurers spent an average of $1,470 per person covered, compared with $1,043 in 2007-08,” Dr Webster said.
The total number of people holding private health insurance decreased by almost two million over the decade.
Shadow Health Minister Chris Bowen, however, said the report confirmed that the Government “just isn’t getting it” when it comes to health care.
“Australians have never paid more for health care out of their own pocket while the Coalition Government’s health spending growth is going backwards,” Mr Bowen said.
“According to (the report’s) numbers, Australians spend over $30 billion a year on out of pocket health costs. This means Australians are paying a record average of $1,578 out of their own pocket for essential health care each year.
“This is while Government spending growth on health is at decade lows and health expenditure has reduced as a percentage of revenue.
“It’s no wonder 1.3 million Australians avoid Medicare services per year due to cost.”
