New Zealand's voters focus on health

Health has been the issue of most concern to New Zealanders in the run up to today's (12 October) general election. Media polls consistently found that health was cited as the electorate's single biggest anxiety even among government supporters.

After five years of health restructuring, New Zealanders' perception of the health system is one of longer waiting lists and fewer services and hospitals than that which the present National government inherited in 1990.

In 1991 the National party set in place a massive overhaul of the health system, introducing accountability and …