published letters

The federal government’s temporary funding bailout for CoHealth (Community Health Centre Stays Open 20/11) is welcome but it ignores the major structural issue of funding for the care of our most vulnerable patients. A GP treating a Brighton billionaire for complex disease receives as much as a GP caring for a patient with similar disease who doesn’t speak English, has minimal understanding of health and disease, is from a different culture, and feels isolated in a strange country. It is 4 years since we suggested to Minister Butler that adjusting GP payments to take account of socio-economic status is feasible and fair. Nothing we have heard to date suggests that such changes will occur, despite the fact that morbidity and mortality clearly correlate with such status.