Wednesday, 4 October 2023

South-West Coast electorate dental services

Roma BRITNELL (South-West Coast) (19:12): (357) My adjournment matter is for the Minister for Health, and the action I seek is for increased funding and support to reduce lengthy dental waitlists in South-West Coast. The famous Chinese proverb goes, ‘Every smile makes you a day younger’. Well, there is not much to smile about in South-West Coast with the state of our public dental system under this Labor government. I am disgusted to see that South-West Coast electorate has one of the longest average wait times for public general dental care in Victoria, at a shameful 38 months. That is over three years wait. This shameful situation means that in South-West Coast there are 3756 patients on the waiting list for general dental care at South West Healthcare. If you are added to the waitlist today, it is predicted you will be waiting until January 2027. In the meantime, the patient suffers excruciating pain and is often impacted in what they can eat and do whilst their teeth continue to deteriorate. This can impact their broader health and state of wellbeing and compounds the terrible state of Victoria’s healthcare system under Labor.

Historically, South-West Coast has not been an outlier for dental waitlists. During the last Liberal government, for example, the waiting time for general dental care from the public dental system in South-West Coast was 14 months, just one month higher than Victoria’s statewide average of 13 months. Under a decade of Labor this waiting list has increased almost 300 per cent. It is now 19 months higher than the state average. That is unacceptable. That is a shameful indication of the Victorian Labor government’s mismanagement of the public dental system, which they savagely cut funding for in last year’s budget, preventing 44,000 patients from receiving vital dental treatment. They should be nothing but ashamed of the suffering they are inflicting. I have spoken with dentists in my area, and facilities are not the issue. Warrnambool has five dental treatment chairs, yet currently less than two chairs can be used on a full-time basis due to lack of staff and senior dentists. The government has done nothing to attract and incentivise dentists to Warrnambool. Senior dentists are required to mentor and support new and training dentists so that they have the confidence to grow in their profession, yet Labor have no plan in place to address this shortage.

Before I conclude I remind the government that the pandemic is not an excuse. The wait time in South-West Coast had almost doubled to more than two years by 2019. In 2014 over 9000 patients in South-West Coast were being treated, and this is now under 7000. That is solely the failure of Labor, and South-West Coast residents are in this position as Labor will not act – and they must act immediately. It is already well overdue, and every day they delay is another day of pain for people with dental health needs in South-West Coast.