Budget 2023: Australians, British to get free prescriptions in New Zealand

Australians and Brits will benefit from free prescriptions. Photo / / 123RF

Australians and Brits visiting New Zealand will be able to get free prescription medicines, thanks to the Government’s policy of removing $5 prescription charges.

National says it is another example of a Government cost-of-living policy funds heading offshore, citing the example of French backpackers getting last year’s cost of living payment.

New Zealand has reciprocal health agreements with Australia and the United Kingdom, meaning we afford people from those countries healthcare on the same terms as if they were New Zealand citizens or residents.

It means Kiwis visiting Australia and the UK enjoy local levels of treatment in those countries too. Both charge for prescriptions (except in Scotland), and the UK has free GP visits.

Exempting Australians and British people from the change would have undermined those reciprocal agreements, although the UK has already moved to do so, introducing a health surcharge of £624 ($1287) on residents visas of per year of the visa - a person on a three-year working holiday visa would pay about $3800.

National’s health spokesman Dr Shane Reti said the spending on foreign tourists could be avoided if the Government had decided to target the policy at people on lower incomes.

“How do we explain that Australian and UK tourists will benefit from the co-pay being removed? It just talks to the lack of targeting from this policy,” Reti said.

“New Zealanders need to consider whether the benefit was intended for the most vulnerable or whether it was intended for UK and Australian tourists,” Reti said.

Reti said National was looking at targeting free prescriptions for superannuitants, people with Community Services Cards (CSC) and people on a benefit, who may not have a CSC.

People with a CSC are already able to get a small number of prescription fees reduced.

A Te Whatu Ora spokesperson confirmed some foreign nationals reap the benefits of the policy.

“Under the health reciprocity agreements New Zealand has with Australia and the UK, visitors to New Zealand from these countries are treated like NZ residents/citizens when accessing healthcare. So, the standard $5 prescription co-payment will be discontinued from 1 July 2023. If they see a non-approved prescriber, then the $15/$10 prescription co-payment applies,” they said.

The policy is one of the largest increases to pharmaceutical funding in recent history.

However, while previous funding injections have funded new medicines for people whose treatments were not funded by Pharmac, this funding boost, totalling $618m over four years, only funds the removal of the $5 charge from medicines already funded.

Patients waiting for their medicines to be given funding will need to keep waiting.

The battle over the charges turned to contraceptives on Wednesday with National leader Christopher Luxon saying National would not exempt contraceptives from National’s policy of reinstating the $5 fees for some people.

Luxon said he would not change the fact that people who are prescribed the contraceptive pill currently pay $5 for it - provided they have not already hit a cap of receiving 20 items of any kind in the previous year, in which case they would receive a free script.

Luxon said National would favour a more targeted approach for “people who are in desperate need”.

“And if people are in that criteria and they actually need help and support to do that then we should definitely support them doing that,” Luxon said.