Latest news with #Breadon
BBC News
27-04-2025
- Health
- BBC News
Australia's universal healthcare is crumbling. Can it be saved?
Experts like Mr Breadon say, above all else, the way Medicare pays clinicians needs to be overhauled to keep healthcare access genuinely universal. That is, the government needs to stop paying doctors a set amount per appointment, and give them a budget based on how large and sick the populations they serve are – that is something several recent reviews have said. And the longer governments wait to invest in these reforms, the more they're going to cost. "The stars may be aligning now... It is time for these changes, and delaying them would be really dangerous," Mr Breadon says. In Streaky Bay though, locals like Ms Williams wonder if it's too late. Things are already dangerous here. "Maybe that's the cynic in me," she says, shaking her head. "The definition of universal is everyone gets the same, but we know that's not true already."
Yahoo
13-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
City council declares Boston a 'sanctuary city' for transgender community
City councilors voted 12-1 Wednesday to make Boston a sanctuary city for members of the transgender community. Councilor-at-Large Julia Mejia and District 9 Councilor Liz Breadon called on Boston to adopt the measure supporting transgender people, pointing to what they see as harmful rhetoric coming from President Donald Trump and the White House. 'Boston is not going to back down,' Mejia said Wednesday. 'We're seeing attacks on our trans loved ones, and here on the local level, a lot of folks are feeling helpless.' Breadon, the first openly gay woman elected to the city's council, said the country is facing "unprecedented times" where "many of our neighbors are feeling unsafe and insecure for various reasons." "This resolution addresses a particular concern that we need to elevate and raise up," she said at Wednesday's council meeting. "During the election and since, there's been an incredible escalation in anti-trans rhetoric and violence that has caused incredible stress and anxiety to our LGBTQI+ community, and especially to our trans brothers and sisters." The resolution states, in part, that Boston has "a specific commitment to protecting transgender and gender-diverse individuals. Taxpayer-funded agencies shall not comply with federal efforts to strip resources that safeguard their rights. Boston will not cooperate with federal or state policies that harm transgender and gender-diverse people and remains committed to ensuring their access to healthcare, housing, education, and employment without fear or discrimination." Mejia and Breadon acknowledged that the resolution is symbolic and nonbinding, but Mejia said the measure is a critical first step and an "opportunity to set the groundwork for the legislation." City Councilor Ed Flynn was the only member of the body to vote against the measure. 'I would like to learn more about what this resolution does,' Flynn said, according to The Boston Herald. 'I don't want to be disrespectful to anybody, but it's just something I would like to have before I vote.' Sam Whiting of the Massachusetts Family Institute, a group that describes itself as recognizing 'the male and female sexes as a real and enduring part of a person's created nature, not an imaginary social construct,' pushed back on the councilors' framing of the Trump administration's actions regarding transgender people. 'We think it misrepresents the executive orders, and we do support these orders and the efforts to protect children from the harms of gender ideology,' Whiting told NBC 10 Boston. Boston's declaration that it's a "sanctuary city for transgender persons" and other members of the LGBTQ community follows similar actions in the Massachusetts cities of Worcester and Cambridge. This article was originally published on
NBC News
13-03-2025
- Politics
- NBC News
City council declares Boston a 'sanctuary city' for transgender community
City councilors voted 12-1 Wednesday to make Boston a sanctuary city for members of the transgender community. Councilor-at-Large Julia Mejia and District 9 Councilor Liz Breadon called on Boston to adopt the measure supporting transgender people, pointing to what they see as harmful rhetoric coming from President Donald Trump and the White House. 'Boston is not going to back down,' Mejia said Wednesday. 'We're seeing attacks on our trans loved ones, and here on the local level, a lot of folks are feeling helpless.' Breadon, the first openly gay woman elected to the city's council, said the country is facing "unprecedented times" where "many of our neighbors are feeling unsafe and insecure for various reasons." "This resolution addresses a particular concern that we need to elevate and raise up," she said at Wednesday's council meeting. "During the election and since, there's been an incredible escalation in anti-trans rhetoric and violence that has caused incredible stress and anxiety to our LGBTQI+ community, and especially to our trans brothers and sisters." The resolution states, in part, that Boston has "a specific commitment to protecting transgender and gender-diverse individuals. Taxpayer-funded agencies shall not comply with federal efforts to strip resources that safeguard their rights. Boston will not cooperate with federal or state policies that harm transgender and gender-diverse people and remains committed to ensuring their access to healthcare, housing, education, and employment without fear or discrimination." Mejia and Breadon acknowledged that the resolution is symbolic and nonbinding, but Mejia said the measure is a critical first step and an "opportunity to set the groundwork for the legislation." City Councilor Ed Flynn was the only member of the body to vote against the measure. 'I would like to learn more about what this resolution does,' Flynn said, according to The Boston Herald. 'I don't want to be disrespectful to anybody, but it's just something I would like to have before I vote.' Sam Whiting of the Massachusetts Family Institute, a group that describes itself as recognizing 'the male and female sexes as a real and enduring part of a person's created nature, not an imaginary social construct,' pushed back on the councilors' framing of the Trump administration's actions regarding transgender people. 'We think it misrepresents the executive orders, and we do support these orders and the efforts to protect children from the harms of gender ideology,' Whiting told NBC 10 Boston.
The Guardian
27-01-2025
- Health
- The Guardian
How Australia's ‘unfair' dental system – and the way $1.3bn is spent – is driving inequality and leaving millions of people behind
Patients bear the brunt of dentist fees. But of the $1.3bn the federal government spends on the nation's teeth, more than half goes to subsidising the uptake of private health insurance. The inequality of Australia's dental care system can be seen in the numbers, says Peter Breadon, the health program director at the Grattan Institute. As people who cannot afford dental bills delay or skip treatment, untreated dental decay is on the rise and record numbers are turning up to hospitals for dental procedures, Breadon said. 'It is a big problem, and it's a growing problem as the impact of missing out on care builds up and as our population gets older.' Of all areas of health, the share of the cost borne by the patient for dental care is far higher than the other services, and according to Breadon it's being driven by dental care sitting outside the Medicare system. Breadon said, according to Grattan research, the share the patient pays for dental care is nine times higher than GP visits, five times higher than for medicines on the pharmaceutical benefits scheme 'and that is why over 2 million people say they delay or skip dental care'. According to latest Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW) data, Australia spends more than $12bn on dental services. More than 61% of that cost falls to the individual, health insurance funds cover 19%, and the federal government 11% and state governments 8%. 'We've seen the consequences of that [system],' Breadon said, 'with record numbers of people – over 80,000 – turning up to hospitals last year for dental procedures, including getting teeth removed, many of which could have been avoided if people had good access to dental care.' A 2023 Senate inquiry called for the government to put 'the mouth back in the body' by creating universal access to dental healthcare. That would mean expanding coverage under Medicare or a similar scheme. This, the inquiry said, would address the nation's two-tiered dental system where 'around half of Australians have acceptable oral and dental health and adequate access to services, and the other half do not'. Sign up for Guardian Australia's breaking news email Of the $1.36bn the federal government spent on dental services in 2022-23, about $825m went to premium rebates. Most Australians with private health insurance receive a private health insurance rebate – a contribution from government based on income, age and family status – to help pay the cost of their premiums. Of the $2.35bn total expenditure from all levels of government – including $995m investment in the same period by state and local governments to run public dental services – premium rebates accounted for more than a third of spending. Dr Ankur Singh, the chair of Lifespan Oral Health at the University of Sydney, said the insurance rebate exists to help relieve the public health system – but with dental it does not make a difference because so many low-income people cannot access public dental services. Public dental services meet just one-fifth of the needs of already limited eligible groups, he said. Insurance premium rebates only benefits those who can afford private health insurance, he said. 'People experiencing social disadvantage are punished twice,' he said. Breadon agreed spending on premium rebates does not benefit the most disadvantaged, although he said some older people who may not be high-income earners have private health insurance. The remainder of the federal government's $1.36bn spending on dental includes $90m for the Department of Veterans' Affairs' dental scheme and $446m for expenses, including the Child Dental Benefits Schedule (CDBS), and supporting state and territory public dental services. The CDBS covers part or the full cost of some basic dental services for children whose parents receive some Centrelink payments. In the 2023-24 financial year, a spokesperson for the Department of Health and Aged Care said more than 2.4 million children were eligible for the scheme, but only 39.2% used it. A 2023 review found usage much lower for rural children, First Nations children and children with disability. 'Work is under way to further promote the CDBS to eligible families to encourage increased take up of the scheme,' the spokesperson said. Breadon said Australia needs to move towards a universal scheme for dental. According to a Grattan report, the Greens' plan for universal dental, which cost more than $20bn a year once phased in, could be slashed to $7bn if it excluded cosmetic treatments and orthodontics, capped funding and targeted investment in underserved areas. Breadon described current access to dental a 'very unfair system'. 'Skimping on dental care is a false economy,' he said. 'It does lead to these long-term costs that involve people going to hospital for expensive treatments that could have been avoided.' A Department of Health and Aged Care spokesperson said work is underway to develop a new national oral health plan for 2025-34to improve oral health and reduce inequalities. The government supports access to dental care through state and territory funding agreements for public hospitals and adult public dental services, the National Health Reform Agreement, and grants to the Royal Flying Doctors Services, they said.
