LOCAL natural therapists say that if their services are excluded from private health insurance subsidies their business will be affected.
A current federal government review may render as many as 17 natural therapies ineligible for rebates.
To continue to attract the rebate therapies must demonstrate credible evidence of their treatment’s effectiveness.
Dr Sinija George opened up an ayurveda practice in Swan Hill last year and says about 10 percent of her clients access private health insurance rebates.
Only a handful of private health insurers provide coverage for ayurveda, an Indian medical tradition based on herbal remedies and yoga.
“Already we are getting less of a rebate compared to other systems of medicine,” she said.
But Dr George believes she offers patients a more holistic treatment than traditional medicine.
“Ayurveda treats the root of the illness,” she said.
“When a person’s mind is healthy, his body becomes healthy.”
She says her Swan Hill patients already baulk at the $290 consultation fee, and that removing the subsidy will hurt natural therapists across Australia.
For more on this story, grab a copy of Wednesday’s Guardian (April 1).
