Broader Health Care: true reform or sales tactic?

• By: Louise Stewart
• On: 13/03/2007 00:11:20
• In: Australian health care policy
• Comments: 0

All that remains to be seen is whether health funds capitalise on the opportunity by implementing effective wellness programs based on a scientific model to engage members in lifestyle behavioural change programs or whether they implement programs that will simply fulfill the need for supplying something wellness related to members.

With less then 2% of the health budget currently spent on illness prevention and the Productivity Commission figures showing that better preventative care could be expected to save $4 billion a year, the pressure is on the private health insurance industry to produce some results and create greater value for their members.

Many early web-based health programs in the US failed simply because their creators didn’t realise that putting assessments or materials online is no guarantee of success. Poor communications, an inability to engage members and a lack of integration with other programs all contributed to the inaction by members that followed.

Health Economist Paul Gross told the ABC that health funds may not have the willingness, insight or the data to create the benefit structures safely, that's safely for them, so that there is not an excess run on benefit.

Some health funds are looking to implement wellness programs to provide a competitive advantage to acquire employer groups to grow market share and lock-out other health funds and with recent reports confirming that the Australian workforce suffers significant losses in lost productivity due to ill health, employers are listening.

With health funds able to offer up to a 12% discount to employer groups and offering wellness programs as a value add, locking out all other health funds to large groups of employees and making it difficult for other workplace health providers to compete.  What remains to be seen is what this means for our health care system.  T