A public meeting in Westbury on Tuesday evening provided a platform for Meander Valley residents to voice concern over lost preventative health programs.
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About 130 community members from across the municipality and independent, Labor and Liberal politicians attended. Three staff and their programs at the Westbury Community Health Centre were lost when a new federally-funded rural health program, focused on chronic disease, began on January 1, which sees Diabetes Tasmania service Meander Valley.
Meander Valley mayor Craig Perkins said personal examples of why the lost services were important were given by residents. Primary Health Tasmania CEO Phil Edmondson attended and said it was “a good opportunity to constructively discuss options for funding preventive health services which are beyond the remit of PHT’s rural health program”.
Cr Perkins said PHT, who tendered the new program, explained their constraints and program processes.
“They’ve learnt from this process in terms of the way they engage with rural communities and … we’ve learnt on how we need to engage with PHT when there are changes to funding arrangements,” Cr Perkins said.
He said the council hadn’t achieved reinstatement of the services yet, but would still pursue it. Funding uncertainty meant the council was not in a position to fund the services, he said. A federal Health Department spokeswoman said Primary Health Networks made decisions about providers independently of government, and services were coordinated around community need.