30 July 2018 - Vulnerable Australians are being neglected by a primary health system that is poorly integrated, lacks direction and performance targets, and can be difficult to access, according to a new report from the Grattan Institute.

While the Commonwealth’s partial, and staged, thaw of the Medicare freeze has eased some financial concerns, there are calls for larger funding and structural reforms to ensure primary care can cope with the growing chronic disease burden.

The institute has today put forward the case for an overhaul of general practice, pharmacy, allied health, maternal and child and women’s health, arguing “primary care policy in Australia is underdone (as) neither the Commonwealth nor the states have taken the lead”.

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