The only answer to Medicare’s funding problem seems to be cutting services and raising fees. What about stop using GPs as clerk?
Tom, has Barrett’s syndrome and is on medication for life, he is otherwise healthy yet twice a year has to attend surgery to renew scripts. If the scripts were on a card, monitored via the internet Medicare would save $74.10 per year over the course of his life.
Ten to twelve million Australians could be on long term/life medication: $741,000,000 a year. GPs will have more time for their real job and Medicare can give them a better deal.
Patients who need monitoring will have to retain the present arrangement, anecdotal evidence suggests this does not happen. If a doctor does want to check on a patient the card can be tagged and the patient directed to have the card renewed.
While GPS are doing paper work, people who need urgent medical attention are turned away and attend emergency departments. That costs $600 a visit.

Sick notes. Why does Medicare pay for the paperwork of industry, commerce and education institutions? Let them send a supervisor to check up on their people if they can’t trust them. You don’t need medical knowledge to see if someone has a cold or flu. And if the sufferer claims a sore back then the supervisor will have to do exactly what doctors do and take their word for it.
Every year when flu is rife the stricken are told to stay home because doctors cannot help. Yet government figures show that in 2015 three hundred thousand people saw a GP for flu related matters. Mostly to obtain a sick note, so that organisations can tick a box authorising their absence. That exercise in 2015 cost Medicare a mere eleven million one hundred and fifteen thousand dollars.
Joan wanted the housing authority to move her from her unsuitable unit, she was told to get a letter from her doctor stating that the circumstances were affecting her health. Can they not make that decision themselves? Why do they need to involve Medicare?
 

Answer = Blockchain and Smart Contracts

While true, one should not need a doctor in the first place in order to get medication (at market price).

The biggest saving measure would be to allow people to opt out of Medicare (for those concerned with government-income, we might still need to pay the "Medicare levy" as it's just a general tax and not truly linked to Medicare).

As it stands, it is not possible in Australia for Australian citizens and permanent residents to obtain a private health insurance without providing a Medicare number (this is only possible for certain temporary visa holders), then whether you like it or not, if you make a medical claim, the "private" fund will charge Medicare for a portion of the expense (the percentage varies between treatments). Neither health funds nor Medicare are willing to forego this payment, even when the patient is willing to pay that portion out of their own pocket instead.

Think of the possible savings to government if people were allowed to divide the costs of their medicines and treatments only between themselves and truly-private health funds!