Government’s new dental scheme no substitute for CDBS

At first glance, the government’s new Child and Adult Public Dental Scheme (caPDS) looks like a win for the oral health of the Australian public with $2.1 billion promised for the scheme over 5 years.Dig a little deeper though and it soon becomes apparent that the sums simply don’t add up.

What appears to be increased funding is actually decreased funding of a quite considerable margin, accompanied by a substantial lack of detail about the exact form the new scheme will take. The government is actually proposing to remove funding from the two year old Child Dental Benefits Schedule (CDBS), and divert it to the States for dispersal through their already-overstretched public health systems.

The caPDS, which will also replace the National Partnership Agreement on Adult Dental Services, is being hailed by the government as “a doubling of the Commonwealth’s current contribution to the states and territories for public dental services”, with over 10 million Australians now eligible to receive treatment, including 5.3 million children under 18.

However, what is happening in effect is an approximately $200 million a year cut to dental services with only $420 million a year of the $616 million currently allocated to the CDBS going to the caPDS. Cumulatively this amounts to an approximate $1 billion cut in overall funding of dental services over the five years envisaged for the initial phase of the scheme, with successful funding contingent on the negotiation of new funding arrangements with the States.

This revised funding arrangement accounts for the $2.1 billion allocated to the caPDS, with the remainder of expenditure on dental services drawn from savings elsewhere in the health budget, private health insurance rebate, the Commonwealth’s contribution to in-hospital dental services, and dental infrastructure in rural and remote Australia.

It’s worth noting that the promised funding is for services only and does not provide additional money for infrastructure or personnel to deliver the additional services.

There is considerable scepticism that the caPDS will be anywhere near as successful as the government claims, and it will likely leave many Australians worse off than before when it comes to their oral health, says ADA President Dr Rick Olive.

“Supposedly the new Plan will see a reduction in Commonwealth funding which will magically make dental services available to more Australians by enabling them to access the public sector for care.

“This is fanciful. The State and Territory public sector dental services are already over extended with waiting lists of between 9 months to 3 years depending which state you consider. What is happening is the Government is promising delivery but it is doing it in such a way that the services will not, in fact, be accessible. It’s smoke and mirrors.”

The best way forward, the ADA believes, is retaining the CDBS, and using it to model other publicly-funded schemes targeting groups with substantial unmet dental needs such as the elderly and low-income adults.
This approach is enshrined in the ADA’s Adult Dental Health Plan which it presented as part of its 2016-17 Pre-Budget Submission to the government and which provides a means of meeting the areas of community need identified in Australia’s National Oral Health Plan 2015-2024.

The ADA is continuing its campaign to #savetheCDBS – ADA members, allied health professionals and the public are urged to sign its petition (chn.ge/1M3s1Sg) - which it believes is the best model for ensuring that all Australians receive equitable access to the dental healthcare they deserve.