Primary Care Budget.
The exact amount in the Vote Health for primary care was not specified, however, the estimates were grouped under Primary, community, public and population health services. Some new key areas in the 2023/24 Vote Health Budget are listed below:
- Scrapping of the $5 prescription charge ($157 million)
- Cyclone recovery health-related package for Northland, Tairāwhiti and Hawke’s Bay ($30 million)
- Health equity improvement for Maori and Pasifika ($20 million)
- Winter Initiatives ($99 million)
- COVID Immunisation ($20 Million)
- Freeing up inpatient beds ($118 million).
The primary care spending budget in the previous year has been categorized broadly into Capitation, Flexible funding, Immunisation, System Level Measures, After Hours Spending and Primary Mental Health Funding which is a guide for the primary care budget of this new budget cycle. The 2022/23 Primary care spending had a 3% increase in the contract value, however, the increase was not implemented across the Flexible funding category. A funding framework for General practice / PHO funding in the 2022/ 23 cycle provided below (Fig 3) shows how funding flows from Te Whatu Ora and contract types in the last budget cycle. Capitation, the payment mechanism for the GPs had the largest portion followed by Flexible funding and Primary Mental Health.
