The Press MONDAY, FEBRUARY 19, 1973. Private hospitals

Press, Volume CXIII, Issue 33154, 19 February 1973, Page 12

The Press MONDAY, FEBRUARY 19, 1973. Private hospitals

Many persons might share the concern of the public and social affairs committee of the Anglican Church regarding the effects of an increasing number of New Zealanders joining private health insurance schemes. Similar concern was expressed last year in Parliament by the Prime Minister (Mr Kirk), as Leader of the Opposition, and by the member for Lyttelton (Mr T. M. McGuigan). Both politicians suggested that waiting lists for non-urgent surgery were being reduced because more people were being forced to join medical insurance schemes and to use private he pitals to the detriment of the public hospital system. The Anglican committee’s report argues that competition between private and public sy stems of health leads to undesirable pressure on scarce resources. Work in private hospitals is more attractive to doctors because higher fees are paid: as the staff of public hospitals diminishes, yet more patients and doctors are drawn to the private system.

The arguments might well justify higher expenditure on public hospitals to improve the quality of some services and the remuneration of staff. They do not justify criticism of the alternative system of private hospitals without which the pressure on public hospital services would be even more serious. No urgent cases are denied admission to public hospitals. The cost of medical insurance is not so high as to be an intolerable burden on most of the community; at the same time it allows persons requiring treatment which is not urgent to choose the time and place of their admission to hospital. If. as the Anglican report suggests, more than 10 per cent of the population belong to such schemes this should bring welcome relief to a public hospital system which must cater first for those in need of serious or urgent treatment

Private hospitals, in New Zealand at least, can never hope to match the public system in the range of facilities they offer. Nor can they undertake the important training and research duties which the public system must provide. But they remain an important and readily accessible part of the health system, with nearly 4000 beds compared with nearly 17,000 in public hospitals. If the private hospitals are, indeed, draining staff from private practice and the public health system, this is surely a matter on which the Royal Commission on Hospitals and Related Services can be expected to report when its hearings are completed. The Government can then decide whether additional expenditure on public hospitals is necessary.