Katy Gallagher (ACT, Australian Labor Party, Minister for the Public Service) Share this | Hansard source

I think Senator Smith should be very proud of the work that the Senate committee did in relation to treatment of perimenopause and menopause, because it has directly influenced some of the decisions the government has taken in listing those new drugs. Again, they hadn't been listed for 20 years. Again, women were out of pocket paying for those. We've also established a new Medicare rebate for menopause health assessments. Over 20,000 women have undergone a menopause health assessment covered by Medicare since they became available on 1 July. In just four months, 20,000 women have been able to access that new item.

As Senator Smith said, we've also got the new guidelines in place, and, of course, all of our policy has been influenced by the work that the member for Cooper, Minister Kearney, did last election and also by the work of the National Women's Health Advisory Council, who led a lot of the consultations. It's time that we got this job done, and we're doing it.