Tony Abbott’s cuts of more than $14 million over the next four years to Cairns Hospital will cripple a hospital badly battered by LNP cuts over the past three years.
There have been reports this week that existing job cuts at the hospital have left the service short of 109 full-time nurses, the result of which has been emergency department beds being unavailable.
And overnight there have been more reports of a ‘Code Black’ at the hospital with and several ambulances ramped as there were no emergency department beds available
Cairns and Hinterland Hospital and Health Services will have more than $14 million slashed from its funding over the next four years due to Tony Abbott’s cruel cuts to public hospitals.
“Tony Abbott’s cuts to hospitals in Far North Queensland, including in Cairns and in communities across Cape York and the Torres Strait, will lead to even longer emergency waiting times, increased elective surgery waiting times and fewer hospital beds,” Shadow Minister for Health, Catherine King said.
Hospitals in the North are already under increased pressure due to the Newman Government’s cuts to health and this decrease in Commonwealth funding adds further unnecessary burden to Queensland’s health system.
“In the last few weeks alone in Cairns, we’ve seen how stretched our hospital is. A ‘Code Black’, nurse shortages and ongoing reports of ramping. We’ve suffered significant cuts thanks to the Campbell Newman and now we’re facing another round courtesy of Tony Abbott,” Shadow Minister for Mental Health, Senator Jan McLucas said.
On top of Tony Abbott hospital cuts, his unfair tax on GP visits will cost families and pensioners in Leichhardt around $6.5 million every single year.
“The level of concern in the community about the GP tax is something I’ve never experienced before; pensioners are terrified, parents are worried, students, people not in good health, the list goes on; all concerned about how they’ll afford to live,” Senator McLucas said
Warren Entsch and his LNP colleagues have done nothing to stand up for residents in Cairns to tell Tony Abbott just how much these cuts will impact Queenslanders.
When ambulances arrive at emergency departments and there are no beds and no doctors to receive patients, it will be because of Tony Abbott’s hospital cuts.
Labor will stand up to Tony Abbott’s health cuts and his campaign to destroy Medicare.