EXERCISE PHYSIOLOGISTS FLEX AND GROW AT NATIONAL CONFERENCE IN ADELAIDE ESSA calls out growing GST anomaly in Allied Health impacting community and sector
With
Katie Lyndon,
Accredited Exercise Physiologist & CEO
Exercise & Sports Science Australia (ESSA)
Jackson Howie,
Activate Conference Speaker & PhD Candidate,
Centre for Heart Rhythm Disorders, Adelaide University
SEGMENT
Filmed in Adelaide | May 2026
Exercise & Sports Science Australia (ESSA) this week in Adelaide convened the Activate Conference billed as “where science meets inspiration”, bringing together the latest research, breakthrough ideas and real-world applications from across exercise and sports science.
As a PhD Candidate and Activate Conference speaker, Jackson Howie spoke to Australian Health Journal to share his experience following Day 2 talking about Accuracy of Pacemaker-Detected Physical Activity: Correlation to Cardiopulmonary Exercise Testing.
Australian Health Journal also spoke with Katie Lyndon, Accredited Exercise Physiologist & CEO Exercise & Sports Science Australia (ESSA) about some key messages being communicated in the recently launched Axe The Tax campaign.
When GST was introduced in 2000, healthcare was made tax-free. Exercise physiology was left off the list because it was an emerging field.
Under current legislation, exercise physiology is still subject to the Goods and Services Tax (GST). That means Australians pay an extra 10% every time they see an exercise physiologist, even though its recognised by Medicare, the DVA, NDIS, and private health insurers.
Lyndon talks about what this means in higher costs for patients managing chronic illness and injury, keeping in place barriers to access for vulnerable communities and being a disincentive to use effective, preventive care for the community.
The petition can be found here https://gst.good.do/axethetax/axe-the-tax-on-essential-healthcare.
Source: Adapted from social media posts and transcript
Credit: Instagram clips from Longevity Exercise Physiology, Exercise Healthcare Australia & Mitchell Vautin, Clinical Accredited Exercise Physiologist
-
Nuclear medicine funding a win for men with prostate cancer
Australian men with higher risk prostate cancer now have access to a nuclear medicine scan to help detect and treat metastatic disease, after it was listed on the Medical Benefits Schedule (MBS) from 1st July 2022.
In 2021 over 18,000 Australian men were diagnosed with prostate cancer, resulting in over 3,000 lives being lost – and making prostate cancer Australia’s second most common cause of cancer death in men.
Australian Health Journal spoke with AANMS President Associate Professor Sze Ting Lee and Dr Geoff Schembri on the MBS listing and the efforts to get it listed.
-
Maximising benefits, minimising harms in population health screening
Population screening is an important contributor to advancing health outcomes through the early detection of and successful intervention for chronic disease. The evolution of science, technology and evidence relating to diseases which are or may be amenable to a population screening approach deserve broad discussion and the sharing of expertise and evidence. They also warrant close scrutiny in context of health policy and health resource allocation considerations.
In March, Public Health Association of Australia (PHAA) convened Screening Conference Conference 2025 with the theme of ‘Population Screening for Chronic Disease – Maximising Benefits, Minimising Harms’.
-
Bionic eye trial shows improvements in functional vision for retinitis pigmentosa
Results of the first clinical trial of Australia’s ‘second generation’ bionic eye have demonstrated ‘substantial improvement’ in four participants’ functional vision, daily activities and quality of life over a period of more than two and a half years.
Led by the Centre for Eye Research Australia, Bionics Institute, University of Melbourne and Royal Victorian Eye and Ear Hospital, the trial findings add to interim results which showed that the second-generation bionic eye developed by Australian company Bionic Vision Technologies provided rapid improvements for four patients with blindness caused the genetic eye condition retinitis pigmentosa.
