States push back as Commonwealth plans to slash seniors' private health rebate

A coalition of state and territory health ministers met in Sydney to demand that the Commonwealth scrap its plan to eliminate the additional private health insurance rebate for Australians aged 65 and over. The federal proposal, aimed at achieving generational equity, would raise premiums for more than 3 million seniors from next April, with government modelling forecasting about 44,000 people abandoning private cover.

NSW officials warn the impact could be far larger, estimating up to 80,000 seniors may cancel or downgrade policies and that public hospitals could face more than 23,000 extra surgeries annually. Leaders such as Ryan Park, Ingrid Stitt and Tim Nicholls described the move as a cost shift that would overload public hospitals already coping with a 50 percent rise in aged-care patients stuck in hospitals, now over 3,700. The federal government insists the reform will free $3 billion over four years for other aged-care initiatives and expects only a small uptake in private drop-outs. The dispute highlights growing tensions over hospital capacity and aged-care funding between the Commonwealth and the states.