Impact of Rising Healthcare Costs in Australia on Citizens

This essay examines the escalating costs of healthcare in Australia and its detrimental effects on the population's well-being and access to essential medical services. The analysis highlights the financial strain on individuals, particularly those with mental health disorders and those relying on private health insurance, leading to delayed or avoided treatments. It explores the role of the nursing workforce in advocating for affordable healthcare solutions, emphasizing the importance of respecting human dignity and upholding the principles of Catholic social thought. The essay also discusses potential strategies, such as innovative payment models, to improve healthcare affordability and access, while also highlighting the need for further research to address shortcomings in the current healthcare system and ensure the protection of citizens' rights to dignified and peaceful lives.

Running head: THE RISING COST OF HEALTHCARE IN AUSTRALIA
According to appraisal the status of affordability in healthcare is disheartening. Almost 77% of
the population residing in Australia are faced with major difficulties owing to the affordability
and emerging costs of healthcare. In accordance to a research conducted by the New South
Wales Bureau of Health Information, over 50% of the Australian population, battling with
mental health disorders have avoided adequate medical or therapeutic treatment, with respect to
the extravagant increase in costs of healthcare (Callander, Corscadden, & Levesque 2017).
With passing time, the critical issues of unaffordable costs in healthcare, are taking a
hefty toll on the Australian population. Aged individuals deriving healthcare insurances from
private medical centers have been found to save money by skipping their meals, acknowledges to
the huge financial healthcare costs they are facing, until completion of the insurance period.
Australians increasingly are encountering thrice the expenditures, which are derived from private
and Medicare health insurance, despite the huge disparity between the insurance charges, and the
actual nature of the treatment facilities offered (Spooner, 2018). The life of a fellow human is not
only sacred, but also demands dignity, for a society to maintain principles of morality and
humanity, according to human dignity. Hence, the present Australian healthcare scenario, is
negatively affecting the dignity and common good of people by threatening basic conditions and
rights of a person to live with respect and peace (Calo, 2015).
It is well known that a lack of required healthcare and treatment procedures are major
causative factors leading to deteriorating conditions of a concerned population’s physiological
and psychological health (Chih & Liang, 2017). However, it is also worthwhile to mention that
the rising costs of the necessary healthcare facilities and insurances required by a fellow
consumer, lead to negative effects on the already deteriorating mental condition of the concerned
patient as well as his or her family (Guan, 2018). An absence of risk management for this

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harmful social issue, further leads to fatal effects in health condition, with Australians
increasingly choosing to avoid undertaking necessary and available healthcare options. The
Australian Prudential Regulation Authority noted a considerable reduction in the coverage of
hospital services over the Australia population since December 2017 (Callander, Corscadden &
Levesque 2017). Thus, the present healthcare institutions in Australia, are negatively affecting an
individual’s fundamental right to live a decent life – a key principle in catholic social thought.
Therefore, the need of the hour is the protection of the basic human dignity, by healthcare
authorities and most importantly the nursing workforce, in order to maintain a humanity oriented
health care service delivery (Nicholas, 2015).
In this case, the nursing workforce of Australia can play a fundamental role in improving
the health care scenario for the Australian citizens that have increasing developed apathy towards
the Australian health care system. It is crucial to mention in this context that the nurses are the
first point of contact for the patients with the health care facilities. The patients are the most
comfortable with their nurses and they also share most of their concerns and grievances with the
nursing professionals only. Hence, it can be deduced from this experience that the professional
roles and responsibilities extend further to advocating the needs of their patient population. In
this case, the need for a more affordable cost system for the health care delivery with
implementation of innovative pay for service bundle schemes are one strategic intervention that
the nurses that take to improve the scenario by the means of collaborative campaigning and
petition (Heslop, 2014). The catholic social thoughts centralizes on the concept of human
dignity, the main idea of this school of thought is that the dignity of each and every human being
is to be respected and restored under all circumstances (Calo, 2015). Drawing reference from this
ideology, the nurses must also respect the human dignity of the patients and address the health

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care needs of the common people and take efforts to minimize the commercialization of the
health care services. The direct care nurse initiative is one such movement that has helped in
cost reduction and better care delivery, although there is need for more funding and resource
allocation for such initiatives to be promoted and encouraged in the society.
The above-mentioned reforms conducted by the nursing workforce will take considerable
time to amend the crisis ((Knaus, 2018)). Hence more effective policies should be developed.
(Bentley et al., 2016). There should be enough research performed for the identification of
potential shortcomings in healthcare along with evaluation justifying the existing costs of the
required treatments (Spooner, 2018). Fellow Australians have the right to live which is dignified
and peaceful. Hence, the nursing workforce must follow social catholic thought by protecting the
citizen’s health care rights through improvement of care delivery scenario and provision of basic
human rights (Nicholas, 2015).

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