Greying China: Getting Old Before Getting Rich 

By Pascale Trouillaud (AFP), Dawn.com

January 13, 2010

China

An elderly man lies on a bed at a nursing house in Beijing. 

With more than 160 million people over the age of 60, China is facing an increase of older citizens which is straining health care system and leaving many older people without pensions.

At a nursing home in the suburbs of Beijing, 86-year-old Ma Shufan, still sprightly despite her advanced age, is thrilled to have friends. At her son's home, she likely would spend her days alone.

The best part? Having mah-jong, a Chinese game that uses tiles similar to a card game, partners.

“This is much better than being with my children. They have to go to work, and no one has the time to talk with me. My son did not even have a room for me,” said Shufan, a former school teacher.

With more than 160 million people over the age of 60 and the aging rate growing rapidly, China is facing a curious problem: it is greying while still in development – a challenge other economies have only had to face at a more advanced stage.

The speed at which the number of elderly in China is increasing has alarmed both the government and demographers about the future, with the nation's healthcare system already straining and two-thirds of rural workers without pensions.

“Population aging is going to be a big social problem in China,” said Wang Xiaoyan, the founder of Community Alliance, one of the few non-governmental organisations in China that addresses the needs of senior citizens.

The first generation of parents affected by China's population control policy put in place in 1979 — which the government says has averted 400 million births — is now hitting age 60.

The tens of millions of one-child homes, coupled with mass migration of students and workers to urban areas, has destroyed the traditional nuclear family model.

Instead, ordinary Chinese are coping with a 4-2-1 inverted pyramid — four grandparents and two parents, all the responsibility of an only child.

As a result, half of Chinese people over the age of 60 – 80 million people, or roughly the population of Germany — live in “empty nests” without their children, who are unable to assume responsibility for their aging parents.

“This is why we have problems now,” said Wu Cangping, a 88-year-old demographer who still teaches at Renmin University.

“Children do not have enough money to take care of their parents. We're getting old before we are getting rich!” 

The problem of an aging population has not escaped notice in the corridors of power in Beijing. Authorities have put in place a system effective this year that will give pensions to 10 percent of rural workers. In recent years, they have also been raising healthcare allotments for the elderly.

The government wants to allow 90 percent of older people to receive family care with welfare assistance, six percent to receive state-backed community care services and the other four percent to move to nursing facilities.

But the country’s 40,000 retirement homes only have 2.5 million beds — enough for barely more than a quarter of the eight million it needs.

“Today, we need 5.5 million more beds to fulfill demand,” said Community Alliance’s Director Wang Liwen.

At the Ren Ai (Kindness/Love) home, where Ma lives, construction work is under way. An additional 400 beds will be available soon, a major jump from the current 100 offered, according to Liwen.

“There are not enough nursing homes,” explained Liwen, who has a backlog of 200-300 admission applications.

“The residents of Ren Ai, most of them former workers and farmers with tiny pensions, pay 1,350-1,550 yuan (almost 200-225 dollars) a month to live in the home,” said Liwen.

In the older parts of the home, walls are crumbling and carpets are faded. She offers a tour of the new, windowless 20-square-metre (215-square-foot) rooms — to be shared by up to three residents.

“If their pension is not high enough, or if they don't have one at all, the children pay. But some older people have no children and no money, and we take care of them too. Some old people think their kids have abandoned them,” said Liwen.

Wu, the demographer, is confident that China will not experience the same crisis over the aging seen in some Western countries.

“The government is now spending very little on care for the elderly and health expenses, but that trend is being reversed,” Wu said. 

“Spending on the aged will not create a budget crisis. We have the means to spend a lot on the elderly.”

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