Three month scripts sounds strange to me, my scripts are the first & 5 repeats, so 6 months. Getting scripts from my doctor costs the public nothing. I ring, tell them what I need in replacement scripts, & pick them up a couple of days later at $5 each.

I have an annual drivers licence examination along with a full check up. No bulk billing doctors that I know of in my town, my check up costs about $90 from memory. They send me a blood test form, to be done a few days before my check up. At least that is free, but I have to buy those little sample jars from the local chemist at $5 each from memory. Expensive damn jars in my opinion.

Medicare is just like the NDIS. Most of the money is wasted on the wrong people, typically government.

"Getting scripts from my doctor costs the public nothing. "

I suspect you'll find that the doc still bills Medicare for their a telephone consultation.

"At least that -blood test] is free,"
Again, they charge Medicare direct.

Its actually part of the reason for the waste in the health system. People don't see the actual costs and therefore have no reason to reduce the wastage.

"Its actually part of the reason for the waste in the health system. People don't see the actual costs and therefore have no reason to reduce the wastage."

How do you want people to "see". There no more waste in a big government organisation, than there is in a big private organisation. The fact that all the "juicy plums" that governments have produced over the years have been sold off to private enterprise by conservative politicians with an ideological bent against public ownership, and generally sold at a fire sale price. This selling off of profitable assets, or using slight of hand to make unprofitable services magically appear profitable for the buyer is common.

The public are simply left to carry the can of non profit public assets, and at the same time prop up the profitability of sold off services.

Paul,

So you agree Medicare is inefficient. And try to make excuses for that.

"There no more waste in a big government organisation, than there is in a big private organisation."

That's sorta, kinda true although I suspect you have little understanding of what goes on in private organisations. But big anything has a tendency toward inefficient. That's why government services should be decentralised as much as possible. But that goes against the ideological wishes of the left and of course of bureaucracy.

mhaze,

"you have little understanding of what goes on in private organisations" A statement without fact.

No just worked for such organisations for 30 years, and I ran a small (service) business with two employees, sometimes 3, for 3 years, so what's your credentials? There is waste and inefficiencies in all businesses, big and small, government and private. Most compensate for losses caused by inefficiencies by loading the cost onto the customer. But if you're so bad you can't do that, then its curtains.

I got a lifetime supply of my psoriasis medication from an agricultural chemical company in northern China for just under $900 AU, which included delivery to my door. It has been a first line treatment in Germany since the mid nineties but it is not available in Australia to treat psoriasis, but it is available in Australia to treat RRMS. I got it cheaply as it is also an industrial chemical used to suppress the growth of mold. Incidentally, the 25 kg bag of drug I bought was the equivalent of about $2 million worth of ms drugs a few years ago. The profitability of some drugs is astonishing.