THE Consumers Health Forum of Australia (CHF) is calling for urgent automation of the PBS Safety Net system after it was revealed almost half a million people who qualified for the benefits in 2024 missed out due to the current paper-based tracking system.
The 495,865 people were paying full price for essential medication when they should have received significant discounts, CEO of CHF, Dr Elizabeth Deveny, pointed out.
"The PBS Safety Net is supposed to protect Australians from high medicine costs, but the reality is too many people don't even realise they're eligible," Dr Deveny said.
"We all want to know what benefits we're entitled to - this should be simple."
"The current system is failing hundreds of thousands of Australians who simply don't know it exists, let alone how to track their spending or apply for it."
The current PBS Safety Net system relies on pharmacists or consumers manually tracking prescriptions, usually requiring people to visit the same pharmacy repeatedly, which is an impractical requirement for many Australians.
"It's 2025, surely we can do better than using a manual paper-based tracking system,"Dr Deveny said.
"We wouldn't accept a paper-based system for the Medicare Safety Net, so why do we accept it for the PBS Safety Net?"
Many Australians are struggling with the cost of living, with accounts of people delaying, skipping or rationing their medication just because they cannot afford it, Dr Deveny said.
"Medicine is essential, and no-one should be going without it," Dr Deveny said, adding that "fixing this is a no-brainer."
The number of concessional PBS Safety Net recipients has almost doubled over five years, from 1.2 million in 2019 to 2.2 million in 2024, while general population Safety Net recipients decreased from around 125,000 to 100,000 over that time.
"We're worried working families and young professionals who earn just enough not to qualify for concession cards are missing out - simply due to a lack of awareness," Dr Deveny said.
"Everybody benefits when Australians can afford the medicines they need, and a healthier population means a stronger economy.
"The government needs to introduce an automated real-time PBS spend tracking system that would automatically apply benefits once consumers hit the threshold, similar to the Medicare Safety Net."
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