Study says seniors care facilities lacking

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Study says seniors care facilities lacking

By Cai Wenjun (Shanghai Daily) 08:42, October 11, 2013

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China lacks facilities to care for the elderly, with a shortfall of around 3.41 million beds, according to experts at Shanghai’s Fudan University.

In research released yesterday, they call for a loosening of the country’s strict family planning policy and say there is an urgent need for more nursing homes and improvements in social support systems.

By last year, China had just 44,304 nursing homes for the elderly, covering just 1.5 percent of citizens above 60.

With the rapid onset of an aging population, China was facing a very serious problem in caring for the elderly, said Lu Jun, who led the research.

Though the number of beds in seniors’ homes rose four times from 1995 to 3.96 million in 2011, the annual rise before 2003 was less than 4 percent. This slow development in nursing homes for elderly had resulted in a huge gap between demand and supply, Lu said.

The experts said the one-child policy, introduced in the late 1970s, had quickened the arrival of the aged society.

It was now the right time to renovate the policy to improve the population structure, which currently has a large proportion of elderly compared to children.

By 2020, China will have 230 million people above the age of 60, while by 2050, they will number 400 million, or 27.8 percent of the population.

“More seriously, the rise of people over 80 years old is conspicuous,” Lu said. “Each year, we have a million people reaching the age of 80. The number of elderly who are not able to look after themselves and those who live alone or have lost their only child is also rising. The nation now has at least a million families who have lost their only child.”

Without the introduction of proper policies and adequate support, the aging population will become a serious problem, according to the researchers.

（Editor：HuangJin、Chen Lidan）