The chief executive of the private health insurance company Medibank has denied telling a function of doctors that he believed insured patients in public hospital emergency departments should receive priority care over uninsured ones, saying his comments were misrepresented.
The president of the Australian Medical Association (AMA), Associate Professor Brian Owler, used his address at the association’s annual parliamentary dinner on Wednesday to recall a speech given by Medibank’s George Savvides at an AMA dinner in March.
“Among a number of other topics, he tried to tell us that they wanted patients with private insurance in a public hospital emergency department to receive priority,” Owler recalled.
“His question was: ‘If your son breaks his arm and goes to the emergency department, and you have private health insurance, why shouldn’t little Johnny get priority?’
“Well, to his surprise, that was not well received.”
Doctors held the view that the patients requiring the most urgent treatment should receive care first, regardless of whether they held private insurance, he said.
“Our emergency department doctors are not going to make a more deserving patient wait because little Johnny’s parents have private insurance.
“Now, our speaker was a little taken aback by the rejection [in the room], but also by the strength of the rejection.”
Savvides did not return calls from Guardian Australia on Friday but a Medibank spokeswoman said Owler had taken the comments out of context.
“[Savvides’] comments were misrepresented,” she said. “He doesn’t agree with those comments.”
In a statement, Medibank said it “does not believe that private health insurance members should get priority in emergency departments”.
“We expect people in most need of emergency treatment, regardless of their personal circumstances, should be given priority.
“Medibank acknowledges the great strain that public hospital emergency departments are under and is mindful that under current regulations private health insurers are limited in what they can do to help address this.”
Owler strongly denied he had misrepresented Savvides, and said 30 other doctors who attended the dinner had heard exactly the same thing.
“He was standing at the podium speaking when he said those comments,” Owler said.
“Perhaps his comments don’t represent Medibank’s official position, but I was just reiterating the comments he made during his speech.
“If he doesn’t believe it, then he shouldn’t have said it, but I know that’s what was said and so do the other doctors present.”
