Health

Principles:

• UnitedFuture believes that maintaining wellness is fundamental to the quality of life of all individuals and families;
• Health policy should be as focused on prevention as much as cure – UnitedFuture therefore encourages healthy lifestyle choices;
• Access to treatment should happen in a timely manner and include access to all health facilities and services across New Zealand.

Key issues

• The current public health system struggles to keep up with the demands being placed on it and will continue to do so, particularly with the increase in New Zealand’s aging population. At the same time there is underutilised capacity in the private surgical sector;
• The cost of health care continues to rise at a rate of about twice that of inflation. The aging population increases the demands on the health system and the decreases the proportion of tax payers;
• Particular ethnic groups have major health issues affecting their quality of life and lifespans;
• Planning for our medical workforce is not undertaken in a sustainable manner;
• New Zealand has increasing rates of obesity and its related problems such as diabetes, the full force of which is yet to hit home;
• Alcohol, tobacco and drug abuse are significant contributors to poor health outcomes in NZ and we have a high incidence of sexually transmitted infections;
• There are part charges for primary health care but not for secondary care;
• The high cost of illness is felt at every level, personally, in families, in lost productivity, in communities and in government expenditure.

The Health System

It is UnitedFuture policy to:

• Retain the current basic structure of the health system, rather than restructuring it, to provide stability for health professionals and consumers and to give it an opportunity to deliver;
• Commit to the public health model so that it continues to assume the key role in the provision of vital health services;
• Ensure that the health system is characterised by a climate of certainty by clearly defining core services, so that New Zealanders know where the public system covers them and where there is limited cover;
• Continue to reduce waiting lists for elective surgery for those who are likely to wait longer than 6 months by requiring DHBs to contract out work to Private Hospitals;
• Investigate the feasibility of a national health insurance scheme, as an extension of the existing ACC scheme, for non-trauma based disability such as elective surgery for the elderly;
• Extend Mobile Surgical Services;
• Continue the rollout of mobile dental clinics;
• Review the administrative and policy compliance burden facing hospitals and GPs, to free up resources currently dedicated to management which should instead be directed towards actually making people better;
• Require greater collaboration between DHBs to reduce management and operational costs particularly in the supply of goods and services, with the view to amalgamating some boards in the future if efficiency gains are not achieved;
• Ensure that ambulance and air rescue services are set and maintained at a level that does not compromise public and crew safety;
• Increase funding for health research to bring New Zealand’s funding up to at least the OECD average as a proportion of GDP;
• Encourage the development of integrated electronic medical records and prescription systems to reduce medical errors, remind patients and physicians about preventative and follow-up care, and facilitate the sharing of integrated records and information across sites of care;
• Expand the role of PHARMAC in the prioritisation and procurement of hospital medicines and vaccines as part of the National Medicines Strategy;
• Ensure that every community has good after-hours medical services separate from Emergency Departments in hospitals.

 

Enhanced Preventative Services

It is UnitedFuture policy to:

• Reassess the efficacy of the national vision and hearing screening programme in schools, and expand access to optometrist tests for children with learning difficulties during primary school years;
• Target infant health by concentrating on the appropriate support for parents before and after birth and ensuring high-quality extended care and support, including home visits, by lead maternity carers and Plunket;
• Support effectively targeted cervical, breast, and skin cancer screening programmes, and establish a new prostate cancer screening programme for men. When fiscal conditions allow develop a national bowel cancer screening programme;
• Increase funding for sexual health/contraceptive programmes;
• Treat child obesity as a parenting issue and use parent education as the first line of attack to reduce obesity rates;
• Develop and fund programmes focussing on better nutrition, particularly for children and youth;
• Expand the prevention work of the Public Health Office;
• Establish a national register for Type 1 Diabetes, a diabetes research fund, and increase funding for Type 2 Diabetes testing;
• Expand the development of strategies to reduce non communicable diseases;

• Support the use of "green prescriptions" through the development of safe and convenient venues for physical activity, such as walking paths and bicycle lanes;
• Establish minimum standards of cleanliness for waterways;
• Establish targets for the quality of soil in which crops are grown. Our health depends on the quality of the food we ingest which in turn depends on the quality of the soils in which it was grown. If the soils lack essential nutrients then so do we;
• Boost funding for Crown Research Institutes to conduct research into the health, wellbeing and productivity of New Zealand soils, and to develop new techniques for remediation of any deterioration that has occurred over time;
• Continue the national strategy, including private sector funding, to insulate all New Zealand homes to at least 1977 standards. This also has benefits for climate change and family finances;
• Work to reduce particulates from car exhaust emissions;
• Make no change to the legal status of cannabis for medicinal use until a robust regulatory testing regime is developed that proves cannabis use causes minimal harm to an individual’s health.

Public education and personal responsibility

It is UnitedFuture policy to:

• Improve public education regarding the safe and effective use of quality prescription medicines, as part of Medicines New Zealand - national Medicines Strategy;
• Support public education campaigns that emphasise the importance of nutrition and exercise and the consequences of poor nutrition such as diabetes, heart disease, stroke, cancer, and premature aging;
• Support public education campaigns that highlight the risks of smoking, alcohol and substance abuse;
• Support community-based education campaigns that empower parents and extended families to take responsibility for healthy eating and lifestyles;
• Encourage employers to offer healthy lifestyle incentives (such as a gym membership) as a supplement to sick day provisions in an employment contract negotiations;
• Investigate the feasibility of a national health insurance scheme, as an extension of the existing ACC scheme, for non-trauma based disability such as elective surgery for the elderly;
• Introduce a free annual health check-up to all over 65s;
• Set aside funding for a public health campaign to promote organ donation and to encourage family discussion about what it means to be an organ donor.

Health workforce

It is UnitedFuture policy to:

• Zero tuition fees for those studying medicine, dentistry, pharmacy and nursing;
• Provide first class working conditions for health professionals as the key to recruitment and development, through the accreditation of workplaces such as the American “magnet” hospital status;
• Develop apprenticeship-style training for caregivers, allowing them to acquire qualifications while working in residential or home care environments, to ensure that they can develop a career path in this field;
• Localise the review of GP co-payments rather than the current expensive centralised review process;
• Support the ongoing development of Nurse Practitioners with scopes of practice for senior nurses;
• Introduce a sabbatical scheme that would allow health professionals to take a year out of work every five years to update their skills and knowledge;
• Embark on a pro-active overseas recruitment campaign, and develop the concept of bonded “working holidays” for health professionals;
• Ensure that funding for the aged care sector covers staffing costs in both residential services and in-home care, and strive for better pay and conditions;
• Support pay parity between nursing staff across all nursing sectors.

Improve Child and Youth Health

It is UnitedFuture policy to:

• Ensure that evidence-based information about immunisation is widely circulated, including the latest international developments, to promote informed decisions by parents;
• Supplement the work of Social Workers in Schools with health clinics where appropriate;
• Develop and fund programmes focussing on better nutrition, particularly for children and youth;
• Improve dental services for primary and secondary school aged children by:
  • increasing the number of dental therapists trained;
  • ensuring DHBs secure sufficient contracts with local dentists for the provision of services to secondary students and additional services to primary age students;
  • continuing the roll-out of Mobile Dental Clinics;

• Improve workforce development and funding available for youth-focused counselling services as the first line of defence, rather than over-prescribing pharmaceuticals for mental health problems;
• Ensure DHBs plan for secure facilities for treatment of young people with mental health problems;
• Promote more research to address youth related health problems such as suicide, alcoholism, and bulimia.

Seniors Health and Aged Care

It is UnitedFuture policy to:

• Investigate the feasibility of a national health insurance scheme, as an extension of the existing ACC scheme, for non-trauma based disability such as elective surgery for the elderly;
• Introduce a free annual health check-up to all over 65s;
• Ensure that older people are fully consulted about their health care and are empowered to make informed choices;
• Ensure that resources focused on the acute health needs of the elderly are balanced by attention to those ailments that impact on their quality of life;

• Ensure there are sufficient community nurses and other welfare agencies so that people can be treated at home where possible;
• Ensure that funding for the aged care sector covers staffing costs in both residential services and in-home care, to improve certainty and transparency, and quality of care;
• Provide better incentives for the nursing, rehabilitation and treatment of the elderly in non-medical institutions, such as rest homes, at home and in retirement villages;
• Support pay parity between nursing staff across all nursing sectors;
• Re-assess the way in which the government funds aged care services, as part of a broader inquiry into future health care costs;
• Ensure that hospices are properly funded so that high quality compassionate palliative care is available;
• Develop apprenticeship-style training for caregivers, allowing them to acquire qualifications while working in residential or home care environments, to ensure that they can develop a career path in this field;
• Investigate the introduction of a carer’s allowance for those who stay at home to look after elderly relatives, from the starting point of providing a limited period of paid leave for those who take time off work to care for their parents in the final stages of their life.

Mental Health

It is UnitedFuture policy to:

• Encourage government agencies to work together on early intervention, prevention, treatment and rehabilitation in mental health;
• Ensure that the right balance is struck between inpatient and community care to prevent people becoming a danger to themselves and society, but with recovery within the community remaining the goal;
• Increase resources for mental health professionals to ensure that those patients who may pose a risk to others or themselves are adequately assessed and treated;
• Increase the number of community-based mental health workers to ease high caseloads;
• Fund child and youth mental health inpatient beds at a level sufficient to achieve the objectives set out in Rising to the Challenge – the Mental Health and Addiction Service Development Plan 2012-2017 and the Prime Minister’s Youth Mental Health Project; 
• Tackle the issue of the lack of accommodation and employment support options for people recovering from mental health problems in the community;
• Increase drug, alcohol and mental health treatment programmes for prison inmates.