Mike Freelander (Macarthur, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I want to make the parliament aware of a particular issue that I think is very unfair. As you know, the government, under health minister Mark Butler, introduced funding for continuous blood glucose monitoring technology for people over the age of 21 with diabetes. This is a very important way of making sure people keep their blood sugars under control. It reduces the side effects from diabetes and reduces hospitalisation, and saves the health system a lot of money. It has been great for adults as well as children to use this technology. However, there is a small group of people with diabetes for whom that funding has been denied once they turn 21—that is, people with cystic fibrosis related diabetes.

Cystic fibrosis causes a number of problems, but in particular it causes pancreatic damage from the build-up of very sticky secretions. This destroys the islet cells, where insulin is produced. It's exactly the same defect in cystic fibrosis related diabetes as in type 1 diabetes—that is, lack of insulin. It's not type 2 diabetes, where there is insulin resistance; this is damage to the pancreas so you cannot produce insulin. It is exactly the same defect. But the department of health classifies this not as type 1 diabetes but as diabetes related to cystic fibrosis. Therefore, even though they have the same defect as others with type 1 diabetes, these people are being denied funding for continuous blood glucose monitoring.

It really is a bureaucratic, ridiculous defect in our system, and it should be changed. It's a very small number of people. It includes people who, because of their cystic fibrosis, often have chronic lung disease and may have even, as adults, had a lung or heart-lung transplant. They have huge costs for medicines and things, but, because of this one definitional, bureaucratic, ridiculous defect, they are being denied funding.

I call on the parliament in a bipartisan way—because the same issue was there in the last parliament, under the Liberal-National government, where these people were denied this funding. I think it is a minor issue, and it is something that could be changed with the stroke of a pen. It would enable people with cystic fibrosis and diabetes to get on with their lives and have much better blood glucose control, less hospitalisation and better health overall.