{"id":1438,"date":"2012-01-04T23:35:47","date_gmt":"2012-01-05T03:35:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/web.colby.edu\/eldercare\/?p=1438"},"modified":"2012-09-29T23:47:50","modified_gmt":"2012-09-30T03:47:50","slug":"chinas-demographic-tsunami-begins","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/eldercare\/2012\/01\/04\/chinas-demographic-tsunami-begins\/","title":{"rendered":"China\u2019s \u2018Demographic Tsunami\u2019 Begins"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Bloomberg News – Jan 4, 2012 11:01 AM ET<\/a><\/p>\n

Wang Fuchuan lies in bed wearing a quilted black jacket, with two comforters pulled up to his chin to keep out the chilly November air. The heating at Beijing Songtang Caring Hospice is broken and the 90-year-old\u2019s nostrils are stuffed with toilet paper to stop them dripping.
\nCockroaches scurry across the floor of his room, which has no running water or toilet. His possessions, a few articles of clothing, are in a plastic bag under his bed next to a pink wash bowl with a sliver of soap. His only entertainment is a transistor radio.<\/p>\n

Wang counts himself lucky. While he has no family or savings, he fought against the Japanese and Kuomintang in the 1940s, so the government pays the clinic\u2019s monthly fee of 2,000 yuan ($318). His 200-yuan pension buys food.
\n\u201cA lot of people my age can\u2019t afford to be here,\u201d Wang says. \u201cThe food isn\u2019t too good, but I have nothing else to complain about.\u201d
\nWang is in the vanguard of a looming demographic shift for China, Bloomberg Businessweek reports in its Jan. 9 issue. The latest government census shows 178 million Chinese were over 60 in 2009. That figure could reach 437 million — one third of the population — by 2050, the United Nations forecasts. While the elderly were looked after in the past by their children, urbanization and the nation\u2019s one-child policy have eroded the tradition of family care.
\n\u201cIt\u2019s a demographic tsunami,\u201d says Joseph J. Christian, a fellow at the Asia Center at the Harvard Kennedy School, and former DLA Piper partner in Hong Kong, who specializes in senior housing issues in China. \u201cThe whole multi\u00adgenerational housing model has disappeared.\u201d
\n<\/strong><\/p>\n

Japan\u2019s Shadow<\/strong>
\nChina\u2019s challenge is similar to that faced by Japan in the 1990s, with one essential difference: China will grow old before it gets rich. With tens of millions of parents left to fend for themselves, the government set up a National Committee on Aging to try to devise a comprehensive strategy (CHGE7) to ensure their health and comfort.<\/p>\n

The latest five-year plan still gives families primary responsibility for elderly care. Even so, the government is looking to the private sector, nongovernmental organizations, and local communities for a more sustainable solution. So far only a handful of companies provide service comparable to the West, and even care like the kind offered by the clinic where Wang Fuchuan lives is relatively rare.
\n\u201cElderly health care is in its infancy\u201d in China, says Ninie Wang, founder of Beijing-based Pinetree Senior Care Services, which employs 500 nurses providing in-home support to 20,000 seniors in Beijing.
\n<\/strong><\/p>\n

Too Few Beds<\/strong>
\nChina has about 38,000 institutions serving the elderly with 2.7 million beds, enough for about 1.6 percent of the population over 60, according to the World Bank. That compares with about 8 percent in developed countries, the bank says.
\nSome homes are fully staffed government clinics for senior officials or private hospitals catering to the new urban elite. Most are boarding houses with few medical facilities, mainly in large cities. In towns and villages, the situation is far worse.
\n\u201cIf we can\u2019t help people in Beijing, you can forget about any opportunities for helping the rural old people,\u201d says Jing Jun, a professor of anthropology at Tsinghua University.
\nA 2009 survey of 140 nursing homes in the eastern city of Nanjing by a group of Chinese academics found that fewer than a third employed a doctor or a nurse. Most of the staff were unskilled rural migrant workers with minimal training.
\n\u201cThe goal at these homes is subsistence for residents whose children can\u2019t take care of them,\u201d says Zhanlian Feng, a gerontologist at Brown University who wrote a paper based on the survey in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society. Many clinics refuse people who require full-time nursing. Others may force out residents once they become too needy, he says.<\/p>\n

Open to Abuse<\/strong>
\nThere are no industry standards and little government oversight, much like the U.S. decades ago when the system was open to abuse, Feng says. In August, the state-run China Daily newspaper carried a report about a man in Anhui province who discovered that staff at a local nursing home tied his father\u2019s hands to his bed for 11 hours a night.<\/p>\n

At the other end of the spectrum, the facilities and care rival many establishments in the West.
\nOn a recent Friday at Cherish-Yearn, a complex on the outskirts of Shanghai with apartments for 1,600 seniors, silver- haired couples shuffled to the strains of \u201cNever on Sunday\u201d in the dance hall. In activity rooms nearby, others tried calligraphy, computer games, and traditional ink painting. Outside, there\u2019s a miniature putting green.<\/p>\n

Medical Facilities<\/strong>
\nIt wasn\u2019t dance classes, golf, or even the on-site financial advice that prompted Luo Zhong Bao, 78, and his wife to sell their apartment and move to Cherish-Yearn three years ago. It was the medical facilities that offered peace of mind to their four children.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey work and have no time,\u201d Luo says. \u201cThe hospital here is good, and they don\u2019t have to worry about anything.\u201d
\nA handful of foreign companies are jumping into the business. China Senior Care, a venture with U.S. backers, is building a 64-bed assisted-living center in Hangzhou aimed at Chinese who can afford to pay more than 30,000 yuan per month. Right at Home, an Omaha company that introduced home-care franchises to China in June, aims to open dozens of affiliates by 2017. The company charges about 100 yuan per hour of service from caregivers trained in everything from vacuuming to CPR.<\/p>\n

No Time<\/strong>
\n\u201cI don\u2019t want to be a burden,\u201d says Du Li, an 85-year-old former government accountant in Beijing with a daughter and son living in the city. While she\u2019s fit enough to climb four flights of stairs twice a day to her three-bedroom apartment in the leafy Sanlitun district, she\u2019s grateful for the massages and help with chores that her Right at Home caregiver offers.
\n\u201cI don\u2019t think my children have enough time,\u201d Du says. With her caregiver, \u201cLife is more colorful. I have a companion.\u201d<\/p>\n

Few of China\u2019s growing ranks of elderly can afford those services. \u201cInternational players are looking for high-net-worth clients,\u201d says Mark Spitalnik, founder of China Senior Care. \u201cThe true problem for the government is people who don\u2019t have money.\u201d
\nChina\u2019s economic growth has given it the financial muscle to provide for the growing number of elderly and the government has been rapidly introducing pensions and health-care plans for farmers and city-dwellers, said Li Zhihong, research department director at the National Committee on Aging.
\n<\/strong><\/p>\n

Wealth Care<\/strong>
\n\u201cThe aging of the population will be an issue in China that runs through the 21st century,\u201d said Li in an e-mailed response to questions. \u201cThe Chinese government has all the financial capabilities and capacity to protect the basic needs of the elderly.\u201d<\/p>\n

Not everyone is convinced the government\u2019s efforts will succeed. In a 20 square meter (215 square feet) apartment without heating or an indoor toilet in one of Shanghai\u2019s few remaining old neighborhoods, 81-year-old Luo Jinxiang says his pension barely covers food and medication for his diabetes and the occasional visit to a local clinic.<\/p>\n

\u201cDo you really believe that the government cares for us?\u201d he asks with a wry smile. \u201cDon\u2019t think about it too much. That is the way the country runs.\u201d
\n–Frederik Balfour and Alfred Cang. With assistance by Natasha Khan in Hong Kong. Editors: David Rocks, Chris Power, Adam Majendie.
\nTo contact the writer on the story: Frederik Balfour in Hong Kong at fbalfour@bloomberg.net.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Bloomberg News – Jan 4, 2012 11:01 AM ET Wang Fuchuan lies in bed wearing a quilted black jacket, with two comforters pulled up to his chin to keep out the chilly November air. The heating at Beijing Songtang … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":295,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[41275,40866],"tags":[40861],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/eldercare\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1438"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/eldercare\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/eldercare\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/eldercare\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/295"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/eldercare\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1438"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/eldercare\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1438\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1439,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/eldercare\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1438\/revisions\/1439"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/eldercare\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1438"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/eldercare\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1438"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/eldercare\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1438"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}