Health expenditure in Australia

Brief description

Health expenditure occurs where money is spent on health goods and services.
It occurs at different levels of government, as well as by non-government entities such as private health insurers and individuals.

In many cases, funds pass through a number of different entities before they are ultimately spent by providers (such as hospitals, general practices and pharmacies) on health goods and services.

The term ‘health expenditure’ in this context relates to all funds given to, or for, providers of health goods and services. It includes the funds provided by the Australian Government to the state and territory governments, as well as the funds provided by the state and territory governments to providers.

This data has been superseded, for more recent data on health expenditure, please the AIHW page on [health expenditure](https://www.aihw.gov.au/reports-statistics/health-welfare-overview/health-welfare-expenditure/overview).

Full description

health expenditure by area and source - Contains health expenditure data for each state and territory, disaggregated by area of expenditure and source of funding.\r\n\r\nThe expenditure in this data set is reported in constant prices (real terms) in millions of Australian Dollars. Constant price expenditure adjusts current prices for the effects of inflation, i.e. it aims to remove the effects of inflation. The reference year is 2011-12 hence it reports what expenditure would have been had 2011-12 prices applied in all years. So expenditures in different years can be compared on a dollar for dollar basis, using this measure of changes in the volume of health goods and services.\r\n\r\nNote: There are both positive and negative amounts for the area of expenditure category ‘medical expenses tax rebate’. The medical expenses tax rebate cannot be specifically allocated to the various areas of health expenditure. The medical expenses tax rebate is offset against individuals out-of-pocket payments and recorded as an expense for the Australian Government. \r\n\r\nSee the definitions file for further information on the variables in this dataset.
Definitions - Definitions related to expenditure data