The Catholic welfare organisation has reported that millions of Australians are 'locked out' of the dental health care system because of the high dentist fees resulting in over 1 million lost work days and 600,000 lost school days for students.
The report, "End the Decay: The cost of poor dental health and what should be done about it", undertaken by Professor Jeff Richardson from Monash University and Bronwyn Richardson from Campbell Research and Consulting, found that the direct and indirect costs to the economy are significant.
Among the report's findings are:
• The direct and indirect costs to the economy of poor dental health are between $1.3 billion and $2 billion annually.
• Hospital admissions from dental conditions are the largest category of preventable acute hospital admissions, costing the health system $223 million each year.
• At least 1 million work days and at least 600,000 school days are lost each year because of poor dental health costing the economy at least $660 million in lost productivity.
• Children in the lowest socioeconomic areas had 70% more decay in their teeth than children in the highest socioeconomic areas.
• Adults on the lowest incomes were almost 60 times more likely to have no teeth than those on the highest incomes. While the prevalence of people without teeth has fall to almost zero (0.3%) in the top 25% of incomes, 17.3% of adults in the lowest 25% of incomes had no natural teeth.
• Indigenous people were twice as likely to have untreated decay in comparison to non-indigenous people.
• Nearly a quarter of adults report feeling self conscious or embarrassed because of oral health problems.
Mr Tony Nicholson, the Executive Director of the Brotherhood of St Laurence, said that the costs of poor dental health were being borne by those least able to afford them.
"This report is valuable in terms of putting numbers on the economic costs and the disease burden, but in our line of work we see the direct impact on people's lives. Poor dental health can cause pain that impairs eating and speaking and it can disfigure people's faces, eroding their confidence, undermining their employability and excluding them from mainstream economic and social life."
"Poor and missing teeth are a sign of poverty, and of social exclusion. In the next Budget, the Government has a historic opportunity to start fixing the dental health system. We urge the Government, the Greens and the Independents to consider the very high costs that are already being imposed on those least able to pay and to start developing a dental plan that works for these groups." Mr Nicholson said.
In response to the report, the Brotherhood of St Laurence is calling on the federal government to implement a universal dental healthcare system that would result in people in lower income brackets having access to dental health.