A growing shortage of essential palliative care medicines in Australia is causing significant distress for patients nearing the end of life and the healthcare professionals caring for them.
“Patients are suffering unnecessarily, enduring heightened pain and distress, because the medications that typically control their symptoms are either unavailable or prohibitively expensive,” says Dr Peter Allcroft, Chair, Palliative Care Australia.
Despite repeated calls for action from the palliative care sector, Palliative Care Australia (PCA) says there has been little progress toward ensuring a stable supply of these life-changing drugs.
“A collective of 7 organisations wrote to parliamentarians in early December [2024] trying to escalate this issue after months and months of slow or no progress, people, including children are dying without adequate pain relief,” says Dr Allcroft.
‘Supply becoming increasingly uncertain’
Most of the affected medicines are vital opioid analgesics that have been used for decades to manage severe pain and other symptoms in palliative care patients.
With their supply becoming increasingly uncertain, clinicians are forced to prescribe less effective alternatives, resulting in less reliable pain relief and risking unwanted side effects.
Adding to the distress is cost, with many of the alternative medications not subsidised through the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS).
One of the most startling examples is hydromorphone SR, which costs the public $182 for 32mg, which a non-PBS-listed alternative is $4209 for 100 tablets.
PCA campaign to resolve the ongoing issue
As part of the ‘better access to palliative care’ campaign leading up to the federal election, PCA has launched an 11 point plan to resolve this ongoing issue.
“Our recommendations centre on establishing a national stockpile of critical medicines, fostering domestic pharmaceutical manufacturing, strengthening the PBS, and empowering the TGA,” says Dr Allcroft.
“Four hundred people die every day of a terminal illness — limited or no access to these critical medications has a ripple effect through families and communities.”
With nearly 20,000 signatures already on the campaign’s petition, advocates hope the issue will be addressed ahead of the federal election, ensuring better quality of life for those in palliative care.
