Surgeries will be delayed, nurse and doctor numbers will decline and emergency department wait times will increase in the Illawarra, with the Turnbull Government cutting $11.5 million from the Illawarra Shoalhaven Local Health District from 2017-2020.
Malcolm Turnbull is cutting $715 million out of Australias public hospitals between 2017- 2020, with the $11.5 million cut from Cunningham, Whitlam and Gilmore equivalent to 17,267 emergency department visits, 32 nurses, 1,908 births or 442 knee replacements.
Every public hospital in the Illawarra will be worse off:
- Bulli District Hospital - $220,000 cut
- Coledale District Hospital - $126,000 cut
- Port Kembla District Hospital $370,000 cut
- Wollongong Hospital $4.85 million cut
- Shellharbour Hospital - $872,000 cut
- David Berry Hospital $104,000 cut
- Kiama Hospital $50,000 cut
- Milton and Ulladulla Hospital $200,000 cut
- Shoalhaven District Hospital - $1.7 million cut
Malcolm Turnbull came to the Illawarra yesterday with absolutely no funding or commitments for the Illawarra. He is happy to give big business a tax handout but wont properly fund our local public hospitals and give locals the health care they need.
Every dollar cut from our public hospitals is a dollar cut from our sickest and most vulnerable patients.
Waiting lists in the Illawarra are growing with waiting times for hip surgery hitting 359 days (up from 242) and knee replacements hitting 385 days (up from 318) as at 31 December 2017 according to statistics from the independent Bureau of Health Information.
Access to health care should be determined by your Medicare card not your credit card. But while Malcolm Turnbull prioritises defending big business and siding with the private health insurers our public hospitals continue to be put last.
Labor created Medicare, we will always fight to protect Medicare and we will fight Malcolm Turnbulls cuts to our hospitals.
