We have many things to celebrate this Australia Day— for all its shortcomings even the health system

Australia is a nation with unique attributes to celebrate:  critters as cute as koalas, tucker as fair dinkum as vegemite and even a ridgy-didge health system.

Excuse the seasonal ‘Strine but if I needed hospital treatment almost anywhere in the world I’d take my chances here.

One of the advantages is the choice of public or private hospitals and while that’s not unique the way we pay for them probably is.

There’s a Medicare Levy which taxpayers over a certain threshold chip into which pays for the public system we all have the right to use for free.

And there are various sticks, a higher levy if you don’t have insurance, and carrots, such as the premium rebate, to encourage membership of the health funds.

One of the peculiarities of Australian private health insurance, and the US and UK have their fair share too, is the way prices are regulated by the government.

Last Monday was the deadline for the insurers to submit to government the premium increases they want to meet higher costs for the year starting April 1.

The rate of increase for health insurance, in 2016 a ‘lower’ 5.6% after the government pushed back, is well ahead of the rate of increase for consumer prices and wages in general.  Hence it hurts.

The cumulative increase over the past five years has made affordability the key issue the funds, government, medics and consumers all agree must be addressed.

Without dipping into all the policy issues it’s accepted even if the increase is restricted this year to 5% (and we’ll know soon), many more consumers will either drop or dilute their cover.

Should it take time for industry and government to get their act together around meaningful reform of this area what can the consumer do to find better value in their health insurance?

The first question, if you already have cover, is “ Can I afford NOT to have it?”.

While there is that right to public hospital treatment for all it might not extend in the time or way you’d like for certain procedures and conditions.

So assuming you see the purpose how best to find the value?

There’s a number of ways. The government run privatehealth.gov.au site which has plenty of information but does not answer individual questions.

There are a number of privately-run comparison services, some well-advertised, which provide details on policy and phone-based advice.

There are also services such as the Fifty Up Club which offer their members discounts and special offers on health insurance which are not generally available to others.

In short it does take a little work but given the cost of a average family’s cover in NSW can be almost $4000 a year it’s worth making the effort.

Disclosure: I am starting work for one of the players in the insurance market The Private Health Insurance Intermediaries Association (PHIIA) which has developed a consumer-friendly code of conduct for comparison services.