2019 Health Fund Reform 

In October 2017, the Federal Government announced some changes to the Health Fund rebates which impacted rebates for yoga and other natural therapies. From 1st April 2019, yoga was removed from all health fund lists. Since the announcement in October 2017, Yoga Australia has taken the following actions:

1. Met with Minister Hunt’s (Minister for Health and Sport) principal advisor, Alex Caroly;
2. Participated in media interviews and issued a statement to the Media;
3. Contacted all our yoga friendly health funds to encourage them to continue the rebates for yoga;
4. Partnered with other Natural Therapies organisations to lobby the government together;
5. Encouraged our members and yoga practitioners to contact their local Members of Parliament to lobby yoga to remain as a health fund rebate; and
6. Continued to collate relevant research that shows the benefit of yoga. We worked with our local teachers, educations institutions and International partners to collate relevant research. Some of these are currently on our website.

We understand from recent media releases that the current Federal Government has announced a budget of $2M to re-examine the initial review of natural therapies. The initial review was conducted by the National Health and Medical Council (NHMRC) overseen by the then National Chief Medical Officer, Professor Chris Baggoley, AO.  This review concluded that the list of natural therapies now banned from rebates did not have scientific evidence showing benefits to health.

Yoga Australia is now preparing to lobby the Government and other major parties to work towards adding yoga back to the list of health fund rebates. We are contacting the major stakeholders to organise meetings or writing to them. We will also be contacting our International partners to identify clear research that shows the benefits of yoga.

We know the removal of health fund rebates for yoga has impacted you and your students and are doing everything we can to change this. We have a good opportunity with the election coming and hope to achieve some success here. We will keep you informed as we progress this matter.