Rebate freeze will force city GPs to charge extra

GPs will need to charge around half their patients an $8 co-payment to survive the proposed Medicare rebate freeze, according to new research.

Debate about Medicare reform has until now fixated on the scrapped plans to reduce GP attendance item rebates for non-concessional patients by $5.

But the proposed rebate freeze to 2018 will do twice as much damage to GPs’ hip pockets, according to a paper published in the Medical Journal of Australia.