Painaustralia in the media

Painaustralia’s media involvement during the past month continued to be influenced by our role in educating the community about upscheduling of codeine and more effective ways to manage pain, through the Real Relief campaign. We used the campaign to highlight the extent of the pain problem in Australia, and the need for better education and awareness of best-practice pain management strategies and better access to pain services.

We kicked off the month with an opinion piece A future of better pain management without codeine awaits Australia written by our Board Member Associate Professor Malcolm Hogg, which was published In The Guardian.

We also published a media release, in which we re-iterated our call for better pain management options to be more readily available. We conducted interviews with SBS News, the Geelong Advertiser and Seniors News, which reported our call for a national pain strategy. The story was also picked up by several regional media outlets including the Bendigo Advertiser. In a World Today piece, Painaustralia Consumer Leah Dwyer shared her story about how other pain management strategies have helped her post-codeine.

On the back of alleged reports that codeine prices have increased post-scheduling, our 21 February media release supported Minister for Health Greg Hunt’s call for an ACCC inquiry and backed consumers who are unable to pay more for their medication. This was reported in The New Daily. In related media published in the Herald Sun we also encouraged consumers to re-think their need for codeine, and ensure they get a proper GP assessment for their pain condition.

In February we also shared a media release welcoming Air Chief Marshal Sir Angus Houston AK, AFC (Ret’d) as our national Patron of Painaustralia.