The Rudd Government will invest $872 million over six years in preventative health, to help keep people well and take pressure off hospitals.
This is the single largest investment in preventative health ever made by an Australian Government and supports an historic new emphasis on early intervention and tackling disease sooner.
Preventable chronic diseases like cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes and cancer are major drivers of the growing burden of disease. With around 670,000 preventable hospital admissions every year, tackling chronic disease will help take pressure off our hospitals too.
Importantly, a proportion of the funding will be reserved for reward payments, which will go to States and Territories which meet agreed targets.
Short-term targets include increasing the proportion of their population who meet guidelines for:
* Healthy weight
* Physical activity and nutrition
* Reduced smoking rates.
Long-term targets include:
* Reducing the hazardous consumption of alcohol
* Increasing the proportion of children and adults at a healthy body weight by 3 percentage points within 10 years
* Reducing the daily smoking rate from 16.6% to 10% within ten years.
The funding will deliver preventative health programs and drive reform, including:
* Healthy Children initiatives, to provide preventative health programs targeted at children in schools, pre-schools and child care centres - including healthy eating and physical activity programs
* Healthy Workers initiatives, to provide programs which reach into workplaces, including smoking cessation programs; information to workers about health risks caused by excessive alcohol consumption; and support for employers to provide programs which improve the healthy weight of their workforce
* The extension of the Australian Better Health Initiative ‘Measure Up' campaign to promote healthy weight, and expanding the National Nutrition and Physical Activity Survey
* Establishing a National Preventative Health Agency.
This package will help keep people healthy, tackle the growing burden of chronic disease, take pressure off public hospitals, and help equip the health system to meet the challenges of the future.