The rate at which ACT general practitioners bulk-bill to Medicare has barely shifted since the federal government tripled incentive payments in November last year.
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Just 52.7 per cent of GPs in the ACT bulk-bill, compared with an average of 77.7 per cent across the rest of the country, the latest data from federal health and aged care shows.
This was a territory increase of just 1.3 per cent since October last year, the lowest increase across all states and territories at a time when cost-of-living pressures are skyrocketing as much in the ACT as they are elsewhere.
The data revealed the ACT had an estimated 5500 additional bulk-billed visits since October. Tasmania, with a similar population, had 55,000 more.
Federal Health Minister Mark Butler admitted on ABC radio on Monday there was still "some substantial bulk-billing of people who don't qualify for the bulk-billing incentives" and "it's never been harder, never more expensive to see a GP than it has been over the last few years".
Experts have blamed the low number of general practitioners in the ACT as a contributing factor.
The latest available data on this issue is three years old, revealing the ACT had 93.3 full-time practising GPs per 100,000 people, compared with 117.3 across other major cities. More up-to-date data specific to the ACT was requested in February's Senate estimates but has not yet been provided.
An analysis by online healthcare comparison consultancy Cleanbill has revealed only one general bulk-billing practice open to new patients in each of Canberra's three electorates.
Independent Senator David Pocock said Canberrans were "getting an exceptionally raw deal and clearly we need the government to take a different approach here in the ACT".
"A huge part of the problem is that we have a shortage of GPs in the ACT," he aid.
"On a per capita basis, we have less GPs than some remote areas of the country.
"I'm currently not seeing any policies or investments that would help draw more GPs to the ACT and keep them here."
He has urged a return to the so-called Modified Monash Model of rural-classification bulk-billing which was removed from the ACT under the former government in 2018-19 federal budget. This model gave extra payments to clinics that bulk-billed pensioners, children and other concession patients.
The ACT government has urged the previous model be restored.
Senator Katy Gallagher told Senate estimates in February a review was in place to consider how to distribute doctors more equitably around the country and was due out in mid-2024.
However, she also said the previous model had not had a significant effect on the local bulk-billing rates and any steps to address the ACT-specific problem should be "multi-faceted".
Bulk-billing across the country had been in freefall under the previous Coalition government until November last year, when the Albanese government championed its $6.1 billion healthcare spend as "the largest investment in bulk-billing in Medicare's 40-year history".
