Aging Canadians

From the G & M:
"Canada shows its age as seniors outnumber children for first time"

 

Canada has reached a milestone on its path, shared by the rest of the industrialized West, toward a much older population: The country now contains more seniors than children. The finding, released by Statistics Canada on Tuesday, is stark: 16 per cent of Canadians were 14 or younger as of July 1, while 16.1 per cent were 65 or older. The news has been greeted by researchers with some anxiety but also a surprising dose of optimism. They point out that while health-care bills and pension liabilities will rise as baby boomers enter their senescence, this generation of seniors is richer and fitter than any before it, and that Canada still has time to adjust to its new demographic reality. The country has been moving in this direction for years, but has now crossed a “magic line,” said Doug Norris, chief demographer at Environics Analytics and a nearly 30-year veteran of Statscan. The impact is more symbolic than anything, but Mr. Norris said numbers such as these should help policy-makers focus on the needs of aging boomers, many of whom are reaching retirement age. Mr. Norris pointed to skyrocketing rates of Alzheimer’s and other forms of dementia as a key problem for governments to confront in the next decade or so. Even areas of policy such as city planning will have to adjust, Mr. Norris predicted, as senior mobility becomes a more urgent concern. “We’re a suburban country in large part … but when you get older into your 70s and 80s, I’m not so sure about suburban living. How do you get to the doctor’s?” he said.

Aging and stagnant populations are a problem across the developed world, and by those low standards Canada is faring well, the Statscan report notes. Though the country’s population is getting older, it is relatively youthful compared with other large industrialized countries. In Japan, 26 per cent of the population is 65 or older, compared with 16.1 per cent in Canada. Only the United States, at 15 per cent, has a lower proportion of seniors among G7 economies. The health-care system will have to adapt dramatically to them, said Cindy Forbes, president of the Canadian Medical Association (CMA). At the current rate of growth, seniors will eat up 62 per cent of provincial health-care budgets by 2036, the CMA estimates, a 15-per-cent increase over what seniors consume now. To curtail that kind of spending binge, Dr. Forbes says Canada needs to move “from a hospital-based system to a community-based system” that emphasizes live-in services and palliative care. Where a Canadian hospital bed costs about $1,000 a day on average, home care costs $50 a day, Dr. Forbes said.

 

 

^ This is a difficult milestone to celebrate. On the one hand it's nice to know that so many people are living longer, but on the other side Canadian society now has to change to accommodate the special needs of the senior citizens. Of course it shouldn't be such a surprise since the records would have shown this trend coming and yet, as usual, most people and governments put it off until it becomes a major issue like now. The same thing happened with the Baby Boomers. In the late 1940s-early 1960s millions of babies were born and yet governments, etc did little to prepare (lack of schools, social activities, welfare services, etc.) Now the pension, healthcare and social welfare programs are going to be strained and yet little will be done until it's too late. ^

 

 

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/canada-shows-its-age-as-seniors-outnumber-children-for-first-time/article26595171/