2 March 2020 - Health insurers are calling for the Morrison government to step away from pricing replacement hips, knees and other artificial body parts, to stop alleged price-gouging in Australia’s private healthcare system.
NIB managing director Mark Fitzgibbon said the industry was mature enough to negotiate directly with medical device companies, while his counterpart at Bupa, Dwayne Crombie, called for an open tender process, similar to the public hospital system.
The call comes as health insurers say they have received less than 10 per cent of the promised $250m savings from Health Minister Greg Hunt’s cuts to the prostheses list in 2017.