Australian Prime Minister John Howard's legitimacy to govern Australia has been "fatally compromised" by his government's poor record on indigenous health, concludes an Editorial in this week's edition of the Lancet.
The Australian Medical Association's (AMA) last week published its Key Health Issues for the 2007 Federal Election -- a document that highlights failing areas of the health system in the country. At the top of this list is indigenous health. The Howard Government promised 11 years ago that they would improve the health and social wellbeing of Aboriginal people. The Editorial states there is no evidence that this pledge has been met, with indigenous Australians having a greater burden of ill health than the rest of the Australian population, lower access to health services, more disability, and lower life expectancy.
The Editorial says that this dire situation now looks set to worsen. On Aug 17, the Australian Senate passed the Northern Territory National Emergency Response Bill 2007. This Bill, which was rushed through parliament, is Howard's reply to Little Children Are Sacred: Report of the Northern Territory Board of Inquiry into the Protection of Aboriginal Children from Sexual Abuse. The legislation allows the government to take control of 73 Aboriginal communities in the Northern Territory, boost police and army presence, enforce bans on alcohol and pornography, abolish the permit system--which restricts access to Aboriginal land by non-Indigenous people--and limit welfare payments.
The Editorial says: "But few of the aggressive measures in the Bill address child abuse; most are only likely to exacerbate the problem. The proposed interventions also do not tally with the report recommendations and contradict the approach called for by the authors, who emphasised the "critical importance" of consulting with Aboriginal people when designing initiatives for Aboriginal communities."
It concludes: "Indigenous health is a national emergency that requires investment in health services and the social determinants of health--education, housing, economic development--which underlie the appalling inequalities that Aboriginal people face. The Howard administration's latest approach to Indigenous health will not fulfil its decade-old election promise. John Howard's legitimacy to govern seems fatally compromised based on this critical health failure.
The paper associated with this release can be viewed at the link below: http://multimedia.thelancet.com/pdf/press/Aboriginal.pdf
Journal
The Lancet