It’s Health Literacy Month and Australia’s experience with COVID-19 has shown us just how important health literacy --- knowledge and community awareness about our health care --- has been to counter the pandemic, whether by public health measures, masks or vaccination. The Consumers Health Forum...

The National Medicine Policy Review now underway comes at an opportune, if bitter-sweet, time. The all-embracing impact that COVID-19 has wielded in the health system holds important lessons for the future shape of the way Australia — its consumers, clinicians and industry — manage medicines. That...

As a former general nurse and midwife in outback South Australia, Christine Wakelin brings an in-depth grasp of health issues in the bush. She has lived and worked for many years with husband Barry on a farm, 23 kms from the town of Kimba. “We claim to be halfway across Australia, from Sydney to...

Australia’s health system is no longer fit for purpose and central to the fundamental changes needed should be a shift towards a more wellness-focused and consumer-centred ethos. It is time to move on from the old-fashioned notion that in health policy we pay attention only to the clinician and not...

Kellie O’Callaghan has had her two COVID vaccinations, not only because of her own health conditions but also because she is an active member of her community in Gippsland, Victoria. She is urging everybody to get vaccinated as soon as they can. “That way we can get back to the freedom and doing...

Emily is 22 years old and can’t wait to be vaccinated for COVID-19. The long awaited vaccine signals freedom from the pandemic and the chance to relax from the worry, and to travel, visiting friends and family in Broome. Emily has been working in young people’s mental health since her early teens...