What is the health-care system like in Australia?
A.Australia’s health-care system serves a mix of publicly funded and privately insured patients. The number of privately insured patients has been decreasing quite dramatically during the last few years to the extent that currently only about 30% of the population are covered by private health insurance. This is a great strain on the public system. Q.How is the public system funded? A.Most doctor and hospital care is funded under a Medicare system. For example, if a patient visits his or her general practitioner, it generally costs nothing. The practitioner will directly bill the government for the cost of that consultation. Similarly, treatment at our public hospitals for uninsured patients is free. As I mentioned, this presents a great strain on the public health-care system, and cost containment, as in many other countries in the world, is a primary concern. Australia currently spends about 8.5% of its GDP on health, which is substantially less than the amounts the United States and
