Monday, July 27, 2009

Report into Australia's health system to be released

According to a story in the Sydney Morning Herald, Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, will today release the National Health and Hospitals Reform Commission report which warns that the present system is "unlikely to be sustainable without reform".

There is already a fair bit of hype around the report as can be seen from this quote from the SMH story:

Hospital errors claim the lives of 4550 Australians a year, equivalent to the death toll from 13 jumbo jets crashing and killing all on board, says a report to the Government which urges sweeping reforms of the health system.

I will be interested to read the report, but its apparent reported focus on efficiencies and cost savings makes me cautious.

I am not sure that more controls and measures designed to improve efficiency are the answer to inefficiencies introduced by previous controls and measures designed to improve efficiency! But then, perhaps I am being over cynical.

2 comments:

Kanani said...

I think the way they wrote about it is a very dramatic image!

Jim Belshaw said...

True indeed.