Australian Medicine

The AMA supports making Health Star Ratings mandatory on packaged foods, arguing that the current voluntary system has failed to achieve widespread uptake and allows selective use on healthier products. Mandatory HSRs would give consumers consistent, easy-to-understand nutrition information and support healthier food choices.

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Happy Friday! It’s been another busy week here at federal AMA, and I’ve spent much of it in Canberra progressing several important pieces of work on behalf of you and our patients. You will have seen that we released our submission to the Pharmacy Board’s consultation on pharmacist prescribing. I want to be really clear: this isn’t about turf protection.

These are just some of the red flags detailed in our submission to the Pharmacy Board’s consultation on endorsement for scheduled medicines for pharmacists. In both our media release and submission, we made clear that the proposal would allow pharmacists, with significantly less clinical experience than doctors, to prescribe Schedule 4 and Schedule 8 medicines.

Dr Creely will begin her term today, following the completion of Dr Michael Lumsden-Steel’s successful two-year presidency. After serving as Vice President, she takes on the role as part of AMA Tasmania’s planned leadership succession. A Hobart-based general practitioner, Dr Creely brings broad experience across medicine, health leadership, and policy.

The AMA’s Ramping Report Card 2026 was released last week, and for South Australia the findings confirm what we have long been saying. Despite record investment in beds and frontline staff, the crisis is intensifying. Total hours lost on the ramp across Adelaide’s hospitals have more than tripled in five years, increasing from around 15,000 hours in 2019-20 to more than 49,000 hours in 2024-25.

Total hours lost on the ramp across Adelaide’s hospitals have more than tripled over the past five years, rising from roughly 15,000 hours in 2019–20 to more than 49,000 hours in 2024–25. The report also shows that, for another year, the state government is consistently failing to meet its own targets. SA Health aims to transfer 90% of patients from ambulance paramedics to hospital clinical staff within 30 minutes.

They may be recovering after hospital, living with several chronic conditions, or caring for someone else while managing their own health. Many are taking tablets, inhalers, drops, patches, supplements or over-the-counter medicines, often prescribed at different times by different clinicians. A Home Medicines Review (HMR) can be a key part of making medication management and healthcare safer. A doctor identifies a patient who may benefit and refers them to a credentialed pharmacist.

Under new proposals, pharmacists could be cleared to prescribe restricted medicines with only a fraction of the clinical experience and training possessed by doctors. That is just one of many red flags raised by the Australian Medical Association’s submission to the Pharmacy Board of Australia’s (PBA) consultation on endorsement for scheduled medicines for pharmacists.

Our submission to the Pharmacy Board of Australia's consultation on endorsement for scheduled medicines for pharmacists highlights serious concerns about the Board's current proposal. The Board's proposal would support pharmacists to prescribe Schedule 4 (prescription only) and Schedule 8 (controlled) medicines, where state and territory legislation allows, after completing an Australian Pharmacy Council (APC) approved program of study.