Rural Health Faces $6.5 Billion Funding Deficit
Whilst it is well known that our country cousins have poorer health outcomes, little has been done by governments to address this disparity through targeting funding for rural healthcare.
Every person in rural Australia is missing out on nearly $850 a year of healthcare access, which equates to a total annual rural health spending deficit of $6.5 billion. It is harder to access GPs and specialists as soon as one drives out of the city lights, and rural maternity care has been decimated- with half of rural maternity services closed since current birthing women were born in the 1990s.
Rural families make up about one third of our population, 80,000 babies are born in these regions every year, yet many have to relocate hundreds of kilometers just to find somewhere to birth. Their economic contribution of rural families is to the tune of $500 billion dollars, yet we have maternity deserts across the country, GP access is postcode lotto and there is poor reimbursement for travel to metro centres to access higher levels of care.
The 2023 Nous Group report, funded by the National Rural Health Alliance, a membership organisation of over 50 rural health members showed stark deficits in healthcare spending across our nation. Maternity Consumer Network, and a number of other rural health organisations are calling on the newly elected Albanese government to urgently address the shortfall in rural healthcare funding.
“Women should not be forced to birth their babies on the gravel on the side of the road due to lack of investments in maternity and emergency care throughout rural hospitals in Australia”, said Alecia Staines, Founder of Maternity Consumer Network.
With increasing roadside birth rates, some almost 1 in 50 births, they are wanting to see local maternity services, emergency care, more midwifery access and improved outcomes for country women and their babies.