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PA Media<\/p>\nPA Media<\/p>\n
The British Medical Association said the cost of providing healthcare had gone up “significantly”<\/p>\n
People are avoiding visiting the doctor in Guernsey because it is too expensive, a charity has warned.<\/p>\n
Price increases over the past week saw the average price of seeing a GP in the island rise to \u00a373, up from \u00a370.50 in 2025, according to BBC analysis of the prices listed by the island’s three main providers. The States of Guernsey provides a \u00a312 subsidy.<\/p>\n
Jim Roberts, chief executive of the Guernsey Community Foundation, said: “Lower and middle income households are thinking, ‘I just can’t afford that’.”<\/p>\n
Mat Dorrian, Guernsey representative for the British Medical Association, said the cost of providing healthcare had gone up “significantly” around the world due to rising demand.<\/p>\n
“There’s a lot of pressure on primary care and any healthcare provider to continue to provide quality services at the same level,” he said.<\/p>\n
“It would cost more anyway because of medical inflation, but on top of that, there’s increasing demand from the public for services. <\/p>\n
“So in other words we have higher numbers coming through primary care and secondary care with more complex medical conditions that need ongoing treatment.”<\/p>\n
Roberts warned delaying medical treatment often “made things worse”.<\/p>\n
“That is with the existing costs of seeing the doctor and getting an ambulance,” he said.<\/p>\n
“It stands to reason that as these [costs] go up, and if those increases aren’t matched by people’s living standards and earning capacity, then the problem is only going to get worse.”<\/p>\n
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Mat Dorrian, from Guernsey Community Foundation, warned of the impact on lower and middle income households<\/p>\n
A report by Guernsey’s Public Health in 2025 warned if the healthcare system did not move its focus to preventing ill health it would reach a crisis<\/a> in the next 20 years.<\/p>\n Dorian said island lifestyle was key to the goal of prevention.<\/p>\n “Guernsey is a pretty amazing environment for people to be able to access things outside of medicine that can help prevent them needing to access medicine,” he said.<\/p>\n “So, social prescribing – moving away from prescribing drugs and actually trying to get people outside, interacting and socialising… I think Guernsey has bought into that well.<\/p>\n “Primary care obviously has a role in promoting that… I think there’s definitely optimism that we can keep Guernsey’s population healthier.”<\/p>\n