Medicare is Australia's universal public health insurance, funded through tax and the Medicare levy. Every citizen and permanent resident gets a Medicare card.
What it covers:
- Free treatment as a public patient in public hospitals (including emergency departments).
- A rebate for out-of-hospital services listed on the Medicare Benefits Schedule (MBS): GP visits, specialist visits (with a referral), pathology and imaging.
Bulk billing means the doctor accepts the Medicare rebate as full payment, so the patient pays nothing. If a practice does not bulk bill, the patient pays the fee and gets part of it back; the difference is the gap.
Each MBS service has an item number (e.g. standard GP consults, health assessments). Doctors bill under their own provider number, which is tied to a location.
Temporary visitors and many international students do not have Medicare and use private overseas student health cover instead, so always check before ordering expensive tests.
For an Indian graduate: think of it as a universal system where the GP clinic, not the hospital OPD, is the front door.