The business of general practice, daily

No new Australian GP practice acquisition has reached the ACCC register since Partnered Health's own 3 July Ryan Plaza notification. Checked directly on the register this morning, the only general practice matter under the mandatory merger regime is still Partnered Health's bid for the 11-GP Medicine on Second clinic at Maroochydore (MN-15027), lodged by group entity PH Medical Centres and effective 3 July. It remains at Phase 1 initial assessment with submissions concluded and no determination published, and the determination period ends 14 August; a Phase 1 decision flagged for the second half of July has not yet appeared. The Bupa-Partnered Health parent transaction, reported by AFR Street Talk on 18 June at about $450m, has still not surfaced as a separate notification, so the ACCC and Foreign Investment Review Board approvals the Bupa deal needs remain outstanding. The filing describes the PH Primary Care Group as 67 general practice clinics and medical centres engaging about 570 GPs, majority owned by Quadrant Private Equity through QPE Fund 6.

The data breach at Partnered Health still sits over that acquisition, and there was no new development in it today. As set out on Monday, Partnered Health has named the 21 affected clinics across New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland, Western Australia and the Australian Capital Territory; the information at risk can include Medicare numbers, private health insurance and Veteran Card (DVA) numbers, concession card numbers and clinical records where a clinic held them; and the group holds an interim injunction from the Supreme Court of New South Wales restraining use or publication of the accessed data. The patient-management software vendor Best Practice has been cleared, confirming Partnered Health as a customer but saying its platform was not compromised and that it is not part of the incident response. The breach was detected on 23 June and disclosed to patients on 15 July, a 22-day gap that experts have called unacceptable, though it sits inside the OAIC's window of about 30 days to assess whether a breach is likely to cause serious harm before notifying. For the buyer this stays a live diligence and regulatory-exposure question at the target rather than a change to deal timing, and neither Bupa nor Partnered Health has said publicly whether the breach engages any contractual provision in the acquisition agreement.

In New Zealand the comparator holds its date. Green Cross Health shareholders approved the NZD 270m sale of The Doctors, the country's largest GP network at around 65 clinics, to Tend Health at the Auckland annual meeting on 14 July, and completion is targeted for the end of July, by 31 July. No completion notice had been posted on the NZX as at 21 July. Green Cross is not a buyer in the Australian market and has given no public indication that it intends to become one.