Summary
An estimated $270.5 billion was spent on health goods and services in Australia, which equates to $10,037 per person and accounted for around 10.1% of the nation’s total economic activity.
After adjusting for inflation, total health spending – including both recurrent and capital expenditure – increased by 1.1% compared to 2022–23. This relative low growth is due to the health system adjusting to a ‘new normal’ in expenditure, compared to the increased expenditure during the pandemic period.
Per person health expenditure in 2023–24 decreased by 1.3% in real terms, well below the average growth rate of 1.7% over the decade up to 2023–24. This can be attributed primarily to increased population growth in a post-pandemic period.
In 2023–24, governments funded approximately 69.6% of total health expenditure – $106.2 billion by the Australian Government funding and $82.0 billion by state and territory governments.
Like the previous year, in 2023–24, government spending slightly decreased by 0.1%, while non-government spending increased by 3.7% in real terms.
Government health spending as a share of total government expenses decreased by about 0.3 percentage points, from 17.1% in 2022–23 to 16.8% in 2023–24. This suggests that health spending grew more slowly than other areas of government expenditure.
During 2023–24, key changes in recurrent health spending included:
- Hospital spending reached $113.8 billion, a $1.3 billion (1.2%) increase from 2022–23 in real terms. This growth was mainly associated with an increase in hospitalisations for admitted patients.
- Primary health care was $89.1 billion, a $0.4 billion (0.5%) decrease from 2022–23 in real terms. This reduction was largely due to lower government expenditure on public health during the post-pandemic period.