Australia's peak body for doctors is spearheading a campaign to secure more financial assistance for healthcare services affected by this year's flooding.
The Australian Medical Association (AMA) wants healthcare across the country to be declared essential services for the purposes of support and recovery in the event of a disaster.
It also wants $15 million in grant assistance for about 10 private healthcare providers in the Northern Rivers region that suffered a high level of damage during February and March's flooding, and 15 healthcare businesses with moderate damage.
Dr Brian Witt said his clinic had survived 25 floods during its 116 years on the banks of the Wilsons River, but this year the 4.3 metres of water that entered the building destroyed everything.
Dr Witt said the practice did not have power or phones for more than three weeks, with all six phone lines diverted to one mobile phone that received more than 3,500 phone calls a day in the weeks after the floods.
He said the clinic provided care for about a quarter of the Lismore community, and its time out of action had put a huge burden on the public hospital system.
Paying for recovery
Dr Witt's practice was eligible for a $50,000 small business flood support grant, plus it received $10,000 from the local primary health care network.
But he estimated it had so far cost his medical practice more than $400,000 to rebuild.
Directly across the river is dairy giant Norco, which has been offered nearly $35 million in state and federal funding to rebuild its ice cream factory.
Dr Witt said he was happy another business was receiving help, but said medical services were much more critical.
Peak bodies banding together
The AMA's call is supported by the Pharmacy Guild, the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners, the Pharmaceutical Society of Australia, the Australian College of Rural and Remote Medicine, the NSW Rural Doctors Network and the Rural Doctors Association of NSW.
Lismore dermatologist Ken Gudmundsen said he had tried and failed to secure government assistance, so he turned to the AMA.
"What we are doing is packaging it into one proposal on behalf of us all," he said.
"It is a gift to the government with a little bow on it, to say, 'Here's the problem. Here's the solution. Fix it and we can move on'.
"We've come to a crisis point, to a breaking point, and if we don't get help, several people will leave … then the town will go into a death spiral."
A 'slap in the face'
AMA national president Steve Robson said access to healthcare was fundamental to the health of a community.
"These funding hassles are a slap in the face to every single person who lives in this region, nothing less than that," he said.
"It's really easy to dribble the ball between state and federal but somebody needs to take leadership and sort this out for this community today."
Dr Louise Imlay-Gillespie, Medical Staff Council chair at the Northern NSW Local Health District, said she and her colleagues wanted to improve outcomes for other communities facing the next natural disaster.
"For every day that this continues, we have countless patients not being able to visit their local GP, with worsening physical and mental health conditions," she said.
