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The 2030 deadline for elderly care

The WHO has recently revised its demographic indices and asserted that the 18 to 65 age group is considered young. In the 21st century, when healthcare is powered by new technological and medicinal advances and a better nutritional profile, this is understandable. Middle age has been revised to span the 66 to 79 age group while elderly will be 80 to 99 years. The growing group of 100+ age group will be called the “long-lived elderly”. Well, this news certainly makes me happy as it has extended my youth, even though I have not reached 60 yet! But jokes apart, have you ever considered this irony: when we speak about the future progress and potential of a country, we always refer to the millions of youth who make up that country’s “market”, ready to deliver profits to the companies who ply them with all kinds of products and services, from flavoured sodas to university courses and other options. But when measuring social security and health standards, it is always about the well-being of the ageing population – how well they are treated and cared for socially, the health care facilities available for geriatric care, life-expectancy and quality of life. Nothing puts fear into policy-makers more than the words ‘ageing population’. It conjures the image of ..what? Immobility? Dementia? Disruptive challenge of family care? And yet, population ageing is something that we cannot wish away – it is a phenomenon affecting the whole world. In order to keep our promise to our past, represented by our parents’ generation – and as much as to sow the seeds for our own geriatric future, we need to develop robust policies for elderly care today. The GCC is expected to see a 400+ % increase in its aged population by 2030. We have barely 12 years to put in place a care system that will take into account the changing technology of elderly care, the changing expectations of an elderly generation that really grew up seeing how the impact of technology changed lives and who expect that to translate into commensurate quality of care for their old age. It is a fact in Bahrain that geriatric care is still not as widely discussed as it should be. We are at a stage when we are ticking boxes. Do we have dedicated geriatric hospitals and wards in general hospitals? Check. Do we have elderly leisure care resources? Yes, a couple of elderly day care homes. What about home nursing options that will allow the elderly sick to fade away in dignity, surrounded by their loved ones? Now this last option is offered by some private hospitals but mostly, families opt to admit their elderly ones to hospital for any care more complicated than taking the body temperature. The fact that Bahrain’s population increasingly represents a nuclear family where both, husband and wife are working, puts enormous strain on the natural care-givers. While many families opt for trained nurses or domestic workers to take on this burden, this is an economic strain and also, it denies the elderly the emotional connection and psychological support that they naturally expect Old age need not be defined as a health crisis. Even wheelchair-bound elderly can lead productive and happy lives with just a tweak to their care approach. This includes mandatory health checks, visits and assessment by trained geriatric care social workers and a system of productive voluntary work for those who don’t wish to continue in the office rat race. Ours is a caring society. We need to put in place a system that will give care-givers the opportunity to fulfil their duties towards their parents with minimum stress.

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