8 June 2018 - The Ombudsman’s investigation of Bupa policy changes has highlighted the regional divide in health insurance, potentially undermining reform proposals from both the Coalition and Labor.

Bupa, Australia’s largest health fund, has abandoned plans to remove its medical gap scheme from public hospitals and conceded other contentious policy changes could have been better communicated to members.

From July 1, Bupa will downgrade the cover of more than one-third of its members, ostensibly to remove any uncertainty over what it would pay for certain services. Restricted cover, paying minimal benefits, will become an outright exclusion, for services including hip and knee replacements, pregnancy, IVF, cataract procedures, obesity and some plastic surgery.

Read The Australian article