CANBERRA, Nov. 1 (Xinhua) -- More than 4,000 general practitioner (GP) clinics across Australia now provide free consultations to all patients under the country's Medicare system, up from 2,300 a year ago, the government said on Sunday.
Australian Minister for Health and Ageing Mark Butler said in a statement that 50 percent of all general practices nationwide now exclusively offer bulk billing, compared with 30 percent a year earlier.
Under the bulk-billing system, doctors bill Medicare directly for medical services, allowing patients to receive treatment without out-of-pocket costs.
The increase follows the introduction of the government's Bulk Billing Practice Incentive Program, which provides higher Medicare rebates to clinics where all doctors bulk bill all patients.
According to the statement, more than 97 percent of Australians now live within a 20-minute drive of a general practice that bulk bills all patients.
The proportion of fully bulk-billing practices has more than doubled in South Australia, Western Australia, Tasmania and the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) over the past 12 months.
The Northern Territory recorded the highest proportion among states and territories at 80 percent, followed by New South Wales at 58 percent and Victoria at 55 percent, while the ACT had the lowest at 21 percent.
Rural areas saw the largest increase, with the proportion of fully bulk-billing practices rising to 59 percent, while remote areas remained at 77 percent.
Butler said the expansion was helping Australians save hundreds of dollars a year in out-of-pocket medical expenses. ■
