Hello everyone! Thanks for your participation. Please feel free to write all the questions you may have along this webinar here.

A question for Tom and importance of choice - choice works brilliantly when consumers have complete information on alternatives, outcomes, risks, pros and cons etc.How do you empower consumers with this information so that they can make the 'right' choice for them?

Actually the comparison to the education system is quite limited if not to the contrary: thinking about access to good quality education (schools and beyond) we want to have equality across the nation and not different offers limited to location, finance or other factors. (I know you were thinking more about tertiary education… but also there…)

Karen - Why could the private funding not be merged into the public? .It could!....i.e. you could fund it by taxes say. Would that encourage - Equity. Accessibility. Value?

Question from Karen Eggleston to Tom: Given the public subsidy or financing, to what extent do you think “The Proper Scope of Government” (Hart, Shleifer & Vishny 1996NBER/1997QJE), a quarter century on, is relevant for modeling & understanding the trade-offs in an “optimal” public-private mix for health coverage and service delivery, compared to education, in the US, Australia & more broadly?

In my Health district Private hospitals provide Cancer care to public patients, We have a contractual agreement in place this works really well

Absolutely! Do we have any good data on the importance of choice? Polled from those being healthy vs those of needing health care now… I think it is only asked to those being healthy in surveys…

Improving information for consumers in Australia as to choice of doctor is also an important issue in my view. Consumers and GPs should be able to choose a specialist informed by data on both the cost and quality of the provider.

From anonymous: If consumers aren't enabled to exercise choice in their healthcare, what else is the value proposition to make private health insurance an alternative to public care?

A question relating the role of the p/p mix on driving up (or containing) the costs of health care in the future: especially if you look at the cost of new treatments as a cost driver.

Thank you all! If interested in Oliver Hart’s comments, please see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sDp7ytudbsE. Or those of other economists: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g9JRhGpXC2Y

What role does the real impact of inefficient care play in the costs on the public system? Is addressing the issue of inefficient/over servicing potentially negate the cost burden on these systems??

COVID-19 has brought a renewed look at (the fallacy of) choice…

Is addressing the issue of inefficient/over servicing potentially negate the cost burden on these systems?? Yes. Who decides it is inefficient? how?

Telehealth Australia system Medicare has a bulk billing item number for the Dr's to claim. its very successful.

Andrew - I dont know the answer on this….perhaps the scheme agents, and/or regulators within each system? leaving it to practitioners/clinicians isn’t likely to work… i dont think

Thank you

Thank you