Liberals announce $33m dental plan

Liberal Leader Ted Baillieu launched the Liberal's dental policy at Bentleigh Community Health Centre today.

According to their Media Release, a Liberal Government will:

• "Invest $30 million over four years to cut dental waiting lists by employing public sector dentists, dental hygienists and therapists, particularly in country areas where there is limited access to either public or private dentists.
• Provide 10 additional dentistry scholarships at university. Students who accept the scholarships will be bonded to rural practice for five of their first eight years in the profession".

ACOSS releases report on the state of dental care

The Australian Council of Social Service (ACOSS) has published a comprehensive report Fair Dental Care, and called on the Federal Government "to ensure that all people on concession cards have a free basic course of care every 2 years".

The ACOSS report states that "Australians most likely to be in pain and unable to access dental treatment are single parents, people on low incomes, people living in nursing homes, older people, people living in rural and remote areas and Indigenous people. People with poor dental health have difficulty eating and speaking and often have to suffer avoidable health problems such as tooth loss or gum disease".

Other statistics from Fair Dental Care include:

• About 500,000 people are on waiting lists around Australia for general dental care from public dental services – the average time on a waiting list is 27 months.
• 40% of Australians can not access dental care when they need it.
• There will be a national shortage of around 1500 dental staff by 2010.
• Consumers contributed nearly $3.4 billion or 67% of funding for dental services in 2004-05, compared to only $953 million from Government (19%) and $701 million from private health insurance funds (14%).
• Since 1999, there has been a 45% increase in the price of basic dental services.
• 21% of adults who are not eligible for public dental care avoided or delayed treatment because of the cost of basic dental care.
• Over ¼ of Australian adults experience painful aching because of problems with their teeth, mouth or dentures in 2002 and report behaviour such as avoiding certain foods to cope.

The Victorian Oral Health Alliance welcomes this report and commends it for review by all those concerned about access to basic dental care for low income earners. Parties contesting the Victorian State Election on 25 November should consider the report's recommendations in further refining their dental health policy platforms.

Nationals Plan to improve country health services

The Leader of The Nationals, Peter Ryan launched their health policy in Ballarat today.

In the media release that accompanied the launch, Mr Ryan said

"... the shortage of health professionals in country Victoria was a critical issue that needed to be addressed with short term and long term programs."

A key feature of The Nationals Health Plan related to dental issues was the following commitment:

"Subsidising private dental services to provide services for eligible residents where public dental services are not available or where patients have an unreasonable wait for treatment."

ALP Health Platform released

The Victorian ALP Platform for the forthcoming State Election has now been published. Chapter 3 deals with their Health Policies.

It includes a brief mention of dental care, expressed in the following terms:

"3.12 Until the Commonwealth Government restores federal funding support for dental services, Labor will focus on reducing general dental care waiting times for socially disadvantaged Victorians.

Public dental services are vital to the well-being of Victorians. Following the axing of Commonwealth funding in 1996, dental services have been severely stretched.

Labor will give particular priority to:
• Improving access to dentures for concession card holders;
• Extending funding for pre-school and school dental programs;
• Promoting dental care for pregnant women;
• Promoting fluoridation of water supplies as a public health resource;
• Providing fluoride tablets through Maternal and Child Health to those living in nonfluoridated areas and areas of non-reticulated water;
• Improving access to dental technician training in TAFEs; and
• Expanding the public dental workforce, particularly in rural and regional areas."

Those interested in reading the entire Victorian ALP Platform 2006 (194 pages), should be aware that this is a very large file (over 7 MB).

Sunday Age urges Canberra to assist States with the dental crisis

The Sunday Age published an editorial today urging the Commonwealth Government to get together with State Governments to address the dental crisis "as a matter of urgency".

The editorial notes that "Australia's extraction rate is one of the highest in the world and overall dental health is the second lowest among developed nations. This is what Mr Abbott has washed his hands of. When it comes to dental health, Australians are mostly on their own. This is simply not good enough."

The editorial is accompanied by a news article higlighting calls by the Australian Dental Association "for the Federal Government to take overriding responsibility for promoting dental health as figures reveal that Australia has the highest tooth extraction rate in the developed world".

New Government waiting list figures

According to a media release issued by Health Minister Bronwyn Pike on 28 September, average dental waiting times across Victoria as at June 2006 were 23.51 months, a reduction from the average of 30.98 months in December 2004.

Oddly, this latest media release suggests that there are now only 110,579 people on the waiting list for general dental care, when on 8 September, only 3 weeks earlier, the Minister issued a release stating that “Since the end of 2004, we have reduced the general dental waiting (list) by 84,464 people - from 262,440 to 177,976”.

Whichever figure is correct, the Government and the public dental agencies should be congratulated on the significant improvement.

The Victorian Oral Health Alliance (VOHA) website (www.voha.org) now shows all the latest figures as at the end of June 2006, for both general dental care and dentures. It also shows the change in waiting times for each clinic since December 2005.

Many rural and metropolitan clinics continue to have waiting times of longer than three years, so much remains to be done to ensure that all Victorians enjoy the basic oral care they deserve. To send a message urging continued efforts to improve the situation to the Minister for Health or local MPs associated with clinics with long waiting times, visit the VOHA website and use the email facilities provided.