From today, thanks to the Albanese Government, millions of Australians living with an ongoing health condition will be able to get two months’ worth of medicine for the price of one.
 
People with a heart condition, Crohn’s disease, high cholesterol, osteoporosis, high blood pressure, and many other conditions will get important cost of living relief.
 
Everyone with a Medicare card taking one of these medicines will save up to $180 per year, per medicine. Concession card holders will save $43 per medicine.
 
Every single Australian will benefit from the freeing up of millions of much-needed GP visits, so our doctors have more time to diagnose and treat conditions, instead of simply issuing routine, repeat scripts.
 
Regional Australians will no longer have to travel each month into the pharmacy to pick up the same prescription they’ve been on for decades.
 
Sixty-day prescriptions will be welcome relief during this global cost of living shock.
 
But as well as being good for the hip pocket, it will be also good for the health of Australians.
 
Overseas evidence tells us that medicine compliance increases by 20 per cent with longer prescriptions.
 
That is why every major patient group and doctors’ group, including the Consumers Health Forum, the Australian Medical Association, the College of General Practitioners, and the Rural Doctors Association, have advocated strongly for 60-day prescriptions. 
 
Sixty-day prescriptions have been a long time coming.
 
It was first recommended by the medicine experts back in 2018 but the former Government didn’t accept the expert advice, costing Australians hundreds of millions in fees they shouldn’t have had to pay.
 
The Albanese Government went to the election promising cheaper medicines, and we continue to deliver on that promise.
 
A full list of medicines available in the first tranche of sixty-day prescribing is available here.

As at 1 September 2023.