Ryall Tony: Estimates Debate — In Committee 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Ryall Tony: Estimates Debate — In Committee 
[Sitting date: 01 August 2012. Volume:682;Page:4230. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
Hon TONY RYALL (Minister of Health) 
: 
 Nothing is more important to New Zealanders than their health. That is why this Government works every day with a huge number of very smart people in the New Zealand public health service to deliver better services for New Zealanders in these resource-constrained times. All around the world health services are retrenching. They are cutting the services they offer their people they are cutting the numbers of staff and they are cutting the offering they have to the public. But here in New Zealand under the leadership of both a Prime Minister and a finance Minister strongly committed to the New Zealand public health service we continue to invest strongly. We continue to invest in priority interventions that will not only improve the health of individuals but also move to improve the health of the population within a framework of a need to get greater value. 
I want to thank particularly the chairman of the Health Committee Dr Paul Hutchison who before he came to Parliament was one of New Zealand’s leading obstetricians and gynaecologists for the work he does as chairman of the Health Committee. I thank him for the very strong interest he has particularly in maternity and child health policy here in New Zealand. I think Dr Hutchison’s very strong focus on the importance of immunisation has to be recognised but also I thank him for the very strong advice he has given to Parliament over a number of years about the need to invest in maternal and newborn health. I thank him for working with the Government on the significant announcements that will be made in the next few months about another very significant investment coming in the area of maternal and newborn health and I thank him for the contribution he makes there. 
The Government is very focused on improving child health in New Zealand. We worked hard to lift the immunisation rate which has gone from 70 percent when we started to 93 percent today. In fact the richest families and the poorest families have the best immunisation rates of 94 percent of their 2-year-olds at the moment. We have also invested very heavily in rheumatic fever. As Dr Hutchison said it is a Third World disease that has an incredible impact on Maori and Pacific families in particular. It has actually been a national health strategy since 2001 when Annette King announced that it would be one of the Government’s health strategies. Basically that Government did nothing so we put in $12 million last year and another $12 million this year—huge. Tens of thousands of kids will be regularly throat-swabbed in order to try to really stamp out this rheumatic fever over a period of time. 
This Government has also created a turning point in the fight against tobacco. We have created a turning point in the fight against tobacco. Information in the next couple of months when it is released will show that this Government in a 4-year period has delivered the most sustained reduction in smoking rates of any country in such a period. That information will indicate what happens when you have a focus on not only these sorts of punitive measures which we might have seen elsewhere but also the need to encourage people to change their lifestyle and their addiction to tobacco. That is the huge effort the Government has made to roll out brief intervention conversations between smokers and health professionals not only in our hospitals but also in general practice. One of the most effective interventions to reduce smoking is to have those sorts of conversations but of course the most effective as Professor Blakely from the University of Otago said in the room opposite last night is increasing tobacco excise tax. 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: I am sorry to interrupt the honourable Minister but the time honourable members has come for me to report progress. 
Progress reported. 
Report adopted.