Time To Treat The Cause Of The Problem, Not Symptoms

Sydney Morning Herald

Wednesday January 16, 2008

I would have thought that if the states had agreed to make the Federal Government responsible for all Australian health there would have been a real achievement in objectives and service ("NSW granted lion's share of surgery cash", January 15).

The Federal Government is responsible for all general practitioners, as are the states for the hospital system. There are obviously duplicated cost areas that need to be pruned.

Politicians thinking they have done a great job in obtaining taxpayers' money to fund health problems is just ludicrous.

Michael Johnston Subiaco

Paying nurses a bonus of $3000 after six months and $3000 after 18 months may sound grand but it is not. The $6000 will be taxed, its value reduced by time and it does nothing to fix the reason why nurses are leaving the wards.

The knee-jerk denial of the true cause of the problem, as demonstrated by the NSW Health Minister over the past few months, needs to stop. When the public health sector is run more like a service than a cost centre and staff of all skill and experience levels are treated like more than resources then perhaps nurses, doctors and other staff will stay.

Put doctors and nurses in charge within the health system and give them the power to fix the mess. Until this happens the platitudes being offered are just picking at the scab of a badly infected public health sector wound.

Brian Kelly Carlingford

I am somewhat bemused by the attitude of the Australian Medical Association president, Dr Rosanna Capolingua. She has been a consistent critic of the Rudd Government for providing "only" $150 million towards the cost of reducing hospital waiting lists.

But she never criticised the Howard government for not providing $150 million.

Don Firth Wooli

I am appalled by the gratuitous insult to the NSW surgical community in your editorial (January 15).

The reason that NSW has the best waiting time performance in the country is simple - we have been doing more operations (approximately 10,000 per year). This is a direct consequence of the increased funding by the NSW Government and the work of my committee and the thousands of surgeons, anaesthetists, nurses, clerks and administrators who have put in the hard yards to improve the system.

To suggest that surgeons are withholding admission forms and thereby denying their patients care so as to make the NSW Government look good is surely the most fatuous claim ever made in an editorial.

Patrick Cregan Chairman, NSW Department of Health Surgical Services Task Force, Penrith

Who is the AMA representing when it whinges about the $43.3 million added to the NSW health system? Its members, who stand to benefit by extra cash, or its mates in the Liberal Party?

Does the AMA want to fix the problems in the public health system or just score political points?

Jenny Haines Newtown

© 2008 Sydney Morning Herald

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