Category: Inequity

The Gender Medicare Gap is seeing women pay more for ultrasounds and other health services

Women are often charged more for products and services than men — including health services, as the Gender Medicare Gap shows.

An ultrasound of the scrotum attracts a higher government rebate than an ultrasound of a breast. It’s just one example of the Gender Medicare Gap, writes Obstetrician and Gynaecologist Dr Kara Thompson.

It is a truth widely acknowledged that women attract a gender payment gap for many products and services. Haircuts, clothing, and beauty accessories are frequently more expensive when marketed to women, compared to an identical product or service aimed at men.

What is surprising, however, is that this gender payment gap extends to medical services.

Despite being more complex and taking more time, staffing, and equipment, an ultrasound of the pelvis is worth less medicare money than a scrotal scan.

Again, it is women who are expected to pay the difference and are left out of pocket.

The final example relates to ultrasounds in the first trimester of pregnancy. Arguably one of the most emotive and life-changing ultrasounds, a first trimester ultrasound can deliver disappointment, hope, joy, devastation, or news of a medical emergency in the form of an ectopic pregnancy.

Despite this, sonographers will receive less than a third of the rebate they would expect from examining a male scrotum.

In other words, the government pays a sonographer more money to scan one man’s scrotum, than they do to perform three internal early pregnancy ultrasounds on three different women.

Subsequently, GPs are forced to either charge women significant out-of-pocket costs, or run at a loss for providing these services.

Source: The Gender Medicare Gap is seeing women pay more for ultrasounds and other health services

‘I left with the kids and ended up homeless with them’: the nightmare of housing wait lists for people fleeing domestic violence

People who flee domestic violence desperately need safe, affordable and secure housing. Our study of people on housing waiting lists in New South Wales, Tasmania and Queensland found private rental housing isn’t an option when leaving domestic violence.

Besides the cost, most people fleeing domestic violence aren’t able to provide rental histories and credit ratings. That makes it very difficult to be accepted as a tenant.

The obvious solution is social housing – affordable rental housing provided by government or not-for-profit agencies. However, our interviews with people who fled their homes because of domestic violence revealed they had great difficulty accessing social housing.

Their marginal housing status or homelessness then contributed to some interviewees’ children being taken away. Knowing this risk, others asked extended family to care for their children until they found a secure home.

Prompt access to affordable long-term housing could pave the way for women and children to recover and flourish together. Instead of investing in high-cost practices of family separation and child removal, let’s invest in secure, affordable housing.

Source: ‘I left with the kids and ended up homeless with them’: the nightmare of housing wait lists for people fleeing domestic violence

Hunger and poverty affecting more women than men, new study finds 

Around the world, the hunger gap between women and men is rising, with at least 150 million more women going hungry than men in 2021.

According to a new report from international aid organisation CARE, the world-wide food security crisis has been exacerbated by climate change, the pandemic and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine — widening the gap between the number of women going hungry compared to men.

The latest CARE report, written by Miriam Selva and Emily Janoch from the US branch, showed women were critical players across all levels of food production, despite experiencing more hunger than men.

Investing in female farmers has improved food security, while female controlled crops have corresponded with an increase in overall household food consumption.

Though women are often not recognised as farmers, their land ownership is connected to income growth and improved child nutrition.

Women in rural areas suffer a “triple burden” of being productive, bearing the responsibility for unpaid care work, and connecting communities.

“Gender equality is highly connected to food security at a local, national, and global level,” the report stated. “The more gender inequality there is in a country, the hungrier people are.”

“The less gender inequality there is, the greater the food security,” the report concludes.

Source: Hunger and poverty affecting more women than men, new study finds 

Germaine’s life as an aged-care ‘inmate’

After returning to Australia to sell her home, Germaine Greer, 83, put herself into aged care last year. As Covid lockdowns came and went, she was at times ‘not a patient, but an inmate’.

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Price of justice: Report says female sexual assault victims forced to buy own rape kits

Women subjected to sexual assault in Queensland are struggling to obtain rape kits and in some cases are being charged for forensic medical examinations.

The horrific details are included in the Women’s Safety and Justice Taskforce’s final report tabled by Women’s Minister and Attorney General Shannon Fentiman this week.

The revelations, which taskforce chair Justice Margaret McMurdo has described as ‘heart-wrenching’, have prompted the LNP Opposition to demand the Palaszczuk Government “immediately” make rape kits free and available for all women across Queensland.

In one account, a woman travelled 1300km for an examination only to be turned back because of a miscommunication.

Others have had rape kits accidentally destroyed, or are being left to wait for treatment in emergency departments for hours at a time with no food, water or clean clothing.

The report also found that victims who were not eligible for Medicare were in some cases forced to pay for medical treatment.

Growing accounts of sexual assault against women comes as Queensland leads the nation on proportionally higher numbers of women in prison, with incarceration rates directly linked to experiences of ‘lived’ sexual violence.

Findings in the report highlight that one in five women and one in 20 men in Queensland experience sexual violence, but only 13 per cent of sexual assaults are reported to police.

Numbers of women in prison have grown by more than 30 per cent in recent years, almost four times the male offender growth rate.

Source: Price of justice: Report says female sexual assault victims forced to buy own rape kits

The 2021 Australian census in 8 charts

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Women are more likely to have a long-term health condition, and more likely to have multiple conditions

Women are more likely to have a long-term health condition, and more likely to have multiple conditions

Women are still doing (much) more housework than men

Finally, the census showed – again – that women are doing the lion’s share of unpaid domestic work.

Women were much more likely than men to be doing more than 30 hours of unpaid domestic work in the week prior to census night, and men were more likely to have done none at all.

 

Three or more conditionsTwo conditionsOne condition17.9%17.9%5.1%5.1%2.7%2.7%

Source: The 2021 Australian census in 8 charts

Women’s probability of being in poverty more than doubles after separation

Our new research suggests that while a break up, on average, reduces men’s disposable household income by 5%, on average women’s household income decreases by almost 30%.

It is important we remove policy hurdles standing in the way of women’s financial independence – and that we also provide sufficient support when their income still falls short of preventing poverty.

Source: Women’s probability of being in poverty more than doubles after separation

Women control only 1 percent of shares at S&P 500 companies

Among top executives at S&P 500 companies, women account for only a quarter of the total number, while controlling just 1 per cent of the value of shares held among fellow corporate leaders.

Andreas Hoepner, a professor of banking, finance and operational risk at the Smurfit Graduate School of Business at the University of Dublin revealed to Bloomberg this week that the ratio was unbalanced even after disregarding company founders and outliers like Tesla Inc. CEO Elon Musk – the wealthiest executive in the index.

“We found a giant gender power gap,” Hoepner told Bloomberg.

In the U.S, women make roughly 83 cents for every dollar a man earns.

Source: Women control only 1 percent of shares at S&P 500 companies

This is reality of Indigenous health in Australia.

The average life expectancy for Indigenous women is just 75.6 years of age, compared to 83.4 years for non-Indigenous women.

According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, Indigenous women are more than 10 times as likely as non-Indigenous women to have kidney disease; more than four times as likely to have diabetes/high sugar levels; and are nearly twice as likely to have asthma.

They are four times more likely to die from cervical cancer.

And then, there are the extreme rates of Acute Rheumatic Fever (ARF).

ARF is the autoimmune response to a Strep infection, and several bouts of it commonly causes Rheumatic Heart Disease (RHD) where damage to the heart valves can occur, often leading to heart failure, stroke or death.

Betty Booth was just one young woman from Doomadgee who tragically lost her life to the disease. After being diagnosed with the RHD, notes were left on Betty’s medical file that she should be scheduled for urgent heart valve surgery, and her case be reviewed weekly.

It didn’t happen.

Instead, she was sent away with Panadol.

Betty’s cousin, Marilyn Haala told Four Corners, “Because they said, ‘Oh, that’s another blackfella gone. Who cares? Not gonna waste time…They didn’t care. I’m not ashamed of saying that. We feel like they treat us like animals”.

Adele Sandy also suffered from RHD. In May 2020, the 37-year-old mum of three repeatedly presented to Doomadgee Hospital with serious symptoms. Repeatedly, she was dismissed with pain relief tablets.

By the time she was finally admitted, she was in heart failure.

Adele’s mother, Eunice Diamond told Four Corners, “I felt like an animal, hanging around the door, for my daughter. I was like the horse that come hanging round the door for my foal. And they wouldn’t let me in there.”

 And then, a police officer came out to deliver the news: Adele had died.

Source: This is reality of Indigenous health in Australia.

‘Fundamentally Unfair’: Female Athletes ‘Terrified’ to Rebuff Transgenders, so Hall of Fame Swimmer Speaks Out

Bucha left the pool to attend her freshman year at Stanford, but that summer, she saw a newspaper ad for a 10-mile marathon in Lake Michigan with a $2,500 prize. The catch? She had to swim against both sexes. But Bucha took home second prize, behind a male competitor, while claiming a world record to boot. Then she joined a professional marathon swimming circuit. In 2014, she was inducted in the Swimming Hall of Fame for her achievements.

But the “fundamental unfairness” of those years impelled her dad to sue the State of Illinois and the Illinois High School Association in 1972, seeking equal rights. “The court found, ‘Yes, there should be high school girls’ teams,’” said Bucha. “The interesting part is the judge said, ‘But meanwhile, we will not allow girls to compete against boys, because it is fundamentally unfair to the girls,’ because the girls will probably be beaten by the boys because they are biologically superior.”

This, along with the efforts of other women athletes, was instrumental in establishing a foothold for separate and equal athletic opportunities for both sexes.

Fifty years on, it’s fitting Bucha should stand up again; we’re turning the clock back toward marginalizing women, she thinks.

“Women are being returned to t“We are dealing with a limited number of individuals who identify as transgender, not an entire sex, like women versus men,” she added. “It’s a very small category of individuals that are displacing women, and women only. You don’t see transgender men displacing men in swimming competitions, for example, you don’t see that fundamental unfairness that you see when you have a biological man—meaning a transgender woman—displace a woman swimmer.”he sidelines of sports,” she said. “Fifty years later, that same group that represented me to get rights for women [the ACLU] is now representing the transgender groups, or individuals, to harm one set of individuals only, and that one set of individuals is women again.

Bucha expressed sympathy for transgender individuals, but feels further efforts are needed to achieve fairness for all.

Equal respect ought to be the aim. “Our struggle was, ‘We want to have the same opportunities as men,’” she said. “So, create those women’s swim teams, create those boys swim teams, and … create those teams for transgender swim teams. Allow those transgender athletes to compete against other transgender athletes.

“Or create open competitions, so that all who choose to will engage, as I did back in professional swimming. I knew that I was jumping into a lake to swim against 30 other men. I chose to do that. That wasn’t fundamentally unfair to me, because I chose to be in that competition. We can do the same thing now.”

Source: ‘Fundamentally Unfair’: Female Athletes ‘Terrified’ to Rebuff Transgenders, so Hall of Fame Swimmer Speaks Out