Another programme failure hurts Maori
te-pati-maori
Wed Jun 20 2007 12:00:00 GMT+1200 (New Zealand Standard Time)
Another programme failure hurts Maori
Wednesday, 20 June 2007, 5:08 pm
Press Release: The Maori Party
Auditor’s Report demonstrates another programme failure hurts Maori
Tariana Turia, Health Spokesperson for the Maori Party
Wednesday 20 June 2007
Tariana Turia is greatly disappointed to receive another report, indicating programme failure for Maori in terms of diabetes prevention.
The Auditor General’s report on the “Get Checked” programme reveals that the coverage rates for Maori continued to fall short of the annual targets set by the DHBs.
“Diabetes is an enormous concern for Maori” said Tariana Turia, Health spokesperson for the Maori Party.
The report indicates that the prevalence of diagnosed diabetes for Maori is significantly higher (9.5% for males, and 6.7% for females) than for European (3.4% for males and 2.4% for females). Maori also tend to develop diabetes far earlier than non-Maori, with onset of the disease commonly occurring at age 45; ten years earlier than non-Maori.
“Yet only 40% of Maori expected to have diabetes are enrolled in the ‘Get Checked’ programme, compared to 60% for all other ethnicities”.
“This news, on top of the failure of Waikato’s $4.26m Maori Diabetes Prevention Project, gives us little confidence that this Government is taking the diabetes pandemic seriously” said Mrs Turia.
“The Auditor General’s report also describes concerns about the accuracy of the data in most of the diabetes registers, IT system problems, and huge flaws in the information gathered by PHOs and DHBs” said Mrs Turia.
Few of the PHOs and none of the DHBs in the study knew the number of people diagnosed with diabetes in their district, meaning they could not accurately assess the coverage in their district;
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- Only one of the DHBs was using the information in the diabetes register to plan diabetes services in its district;
- The report concluded that “we do not consider that the measures currently being reported by CHS to the Ministry are enough to establish whether diabetes management is improving”.
“We do not want to see any more investment in failure” said Mrs Turia.
“The Auditor General's recommendation that DHBs must work with PHOs to continue to focus on removing the barriers to Maori and Pasifika peoples accessing the "Get Checked" programme is an important step in making a difference”.
“There are no longer any excuses for failure” said Mrs Turia. “We want providers who have the will to do the job. We must not continue funding poor performers”.
“We also know ultimately, that the key lies with whanau” said Mrs Turia.
“Government must invest in their capacity to manage their own solutions, if we are to find the most cost-effective and enduring difference for the health and wellbeing of all New Zealanders”.
Diabetes NZ predicts that by 2021, type two diabetes will cost the health sector $1.6 billion annually, compared to $540 million a year now.
ENDS
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