More health. Better healthcare.
The Health Reform Group is an independent association of clinicians, researchers, economists, policy makers and civic leaders committed to improving the health of Australians and the fairness and efficiency of the healthcare system that serves them.
HRG exists to grow Australia’s gross national healthspan, the years Australians live in good health. We advocate for reforms that reduce the demand for care through effective prevention, and that make the care we do receive effective and fairly distributed. We are not a think-tank. We are a lean, pragmatic, truth-seeking do-tank.
We are independent. We do not align with political parties, learned colleges, industry bodies or government agencies. We are also not neutral. Australians deserve to live longer in good health, not merely longer and sicker. A healthcare system that grows and thrives while the health of the population it serves deteriorates has lost its way. Saying so plainly is more useful than the careful, institution-friendly language that currently defines the public debate.
What we hold to be true
Health and healthcare are not the same thing. Australia has a world-class healthcare system. It does not have world-class health. Conflating the two lets a system built to treat disease crowd out the intention required to prevent it.
Our burden of preventable disease is unacceptable. Australia carries one of the highest burdens of preventable chronic disease in the developed world. This is not inevitable. It reflects decades of wilful inattention and under-investment in prevention, unchecked industry influence, and a political economy that misprices acute care over population health.
Incentives matter. Advances in strongly incentivised clinical treatments prolong lifespan. Prevention has few if any financial incentives. A fairer, safer, more efficient system will require reviewing these arrangements, including a strategic shift away from fee-for-service remuneration.
HRG is renewing its purpose after twenty years of work, and a policy portfolio is in development. The full set of tenets is on the About page, the history is in Origins, and two decades of papers, notes and collected reading are in the Archive. To reach us, use the contact page.