THE good news is that, at last, Wagga Base Hospital will have an ultrasound machine of its own and patients will not be required to go to a private institution for ultrasound testing.

The bad news is that this situation is an example of the utterly deplorable state of the public health system in NSW.

Although the Labor state government must take responsibility for the current state of affairs, the start of the decline of facilities and staffing levels within the public health system goes back further.

The fact that a base hospital in the biggest inland city in the state has not yet received what is a basic but essential piece of equipment like an ultrasound machine is a clear indication of the government's attitude to public health. This is, as the director of clinical operations at Greater Southern Area Health Service, Dr Joe McGirr, said this week, a "very valuable point".

The Wagga situation emphasises the decline in political attitudes about ensuring public health is adequately catered for.

This blase attitude to local health services should be of great concern to those who live in every regional city and town.

In recent months at least three Labor state premiers have raised the theory about the federal government taking over health care. Rather surprisingly this has received the cold shoulder from the Prime Minister and Health Minister, Tony Abbott.

There is nothing to suggest from this lack of interest that a coalition government is likely to be any more willing and effective in ensuring the public health system gets its fair share of attention.

Why indeed, as a DA correspondent asked this week, should people in smaller centres be required to travel to a city some hundreds of kilometres away to have the basic diagnostic treatment provided by an ultrasound machine?

The Daily Advertiser

Wagga Wagga

September 9 2005