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Australia:
Elderly Have Right to Care
Border Mail
June 20, 2003 Australian
Ageing Minister Mr Kevin Andrews yesterday defended the Federal Government
against claims that elderly people were being left to languish in
hospitals because of a lack of nursing home beds. States
are blaming the Commonwealth for the practice, known as granny dumping. Mr
Andrews told Parliament elderly Australians had as much right to hospital
care as younger people. “The
rhetoric of the State governments in the last couple of days would suggest
otherwise and would suggest a lack of care and a lack of respect for the
dignity of older Australians,” he said. Mr
Andrews said the States were implying that older people should not be
receiving hospital care, and if they were admitted, they should leave at
the first opportunity. He
pointed the finger at the States for sharp falls in the number of public
hospital beds during the past 15 years. “One
in five beds have been slashed from the system by State governments around
the country and the worst of the offenders is the State of NSW,” Mr
Andrews said. NSW
Health Minister Mr Morris Iemma earlier claimed NSW was facing a shortfall
of 7000 Commonwealth-funded aged care places. “Worse,
the number of aged care beds operating in NSW has actually fallen by 2000
in the last year from 51,000 to 49,000,” Mr Iemma said. He
blamed a lack of the nursing home beds for the crisis situation involving
older Australians turning to the public hospital system for care. “We
have the equivalent of 30 hospital wards taken up every day by patients
who are waiting for a nursing home bed and nursing home care,” he said. “It
costs around $354 a day to keep a patient in an acute care bed in a
hospital, whereas it costs around $80 a day to care for them in a nursing
home bed.” Victoria
is also claiming it is 5000 beds short of what it is entitled to under the
federal funding formula of 90 aged care beds for every 1000 people aged
over 70. But
Mr Andrews said the Howard Government had made a substantial commitment to
aged care funding, with its budget boosted from $3 billion in 1995-1996 to
an estimated $6 billion in 2003-2004. “In
the last five years weve released an additional 52,700 beds were on target
to achieve 200,000 aged care places by 2006,” Mr Andrews said. However, Opposition aged care spokeswoman Ms Annette Ellis said the Government had turned a surplus of 800 aged care beds in 1996 into a 10,388 shortfall by December, 2002. Copyright
© 2002 Global Action on Aging
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