Source : Perth Now news
More than 100,000 people are still on wait lists for in-home aged care despite the wait times falling.
The latest quarterly data for the first three months of 2026 showed wait times go down by two weeks for high priority cases from between 1.5 and 2.5 months to between one and two months.
Medium-priority cases have fallen from between eight to nine months to between six and seven months, while standard priority cases are down from between 10 and 11 months to between seven and eight months.
The figures also revealed 364,723 people now have access to support at home places, up almost 18,000 people on the previous quarter.
But despite the increase in places, 100,191 people are still on a waitlist for approval.
Health Minister Mark Butler conceded it was a difficult task to reduce the waitlist as the population ages.
“There’s also an historic increase in demand as a particular generation comes into the aged care system, so satisfying all of that demand is going to be a very difficult job for government,” he told ABC Radio on Monday.
“At a time when demand is growing faster than it ever has in our country’s history, we’re seeing wait times come down at every single level.”
The figures from the quarter showed more than 79,000 places were released during the three-month period, an average of 6088 places each week.
The federal government announced in November it would release 83,000 support at home places by the end of the financial year, despite a delay in rolling out the places by four months.
As of the end of March, 61,500 places have been filled.
It’s expected the remaining places in the release will be filled by the end of June.
Mr Butler said he was confident the government could meet the demand of a growing number of aged care places being needed.
“We’ve put more packages into the system than has ever happened before, it’s a 25 per cent increase in package numbers in one single year,” he said.
“We have seen tens of thousands of more people get packages, we’ve seen the wait times at every level come down, which is a pleasing thing.”
Median wait times for an assessment remains less than one month.
Aged Care Minister Sam Rae said older Australians were able to enter into the system faster.
“While we know there’s much more to do, these numbers are encouraging signs our methodical work to secure more care for more older Australians than ever is shifting the dial,” he said.
“Older people told us they want care they can trust, close to home and at a fair price.”
