Press Releases

Care for the elderly an everlasting job

The government has made considerable achievements in the past two years in providing the elderly a sense of security, of belonging and of worthiness.

This was stated by the Chief Secretary for Administration, Mrs Anson Chan, when addressing the International Year of Older Persons (IYOP) 1999 Closing Ceremony cum Hong Kong Elderly Contest Grand Final today (Saturday).

To enable the elderly to have a sense of belonging, the Chief Secretary noted that the Housing Authority had in the past two years provided 15,000 public flats for the elderly. The Authority has also set a target to reduce waiting time from the present three-and-a-half years to two years by 2007.

As for subsidized residential care homes for the elderly, the average waiting time in 1997 was 28 months. But this has been reduced to 17 months following the provision of an additional 4,300 subsidized places by the Government over the past two years.

Other improvements made to services for the elderly include upgrading the home help teams, opening of carers' support centres, introduction of a new day respite services for the elderly.

Turning to the promotion of a feeling of worthiness amongst the elderly, Mrs Chan said the Government had strengthened social networking services to vulnerable elderly people and recruited elderly persons as senior volunteers.

The United Nations has declared this year the International Year of Older Persons with the main theme "Towards a Society for All Ages". The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region has pledged full support to the event and had organized more than 700 activities at district and territory-wide level, drawing the participation of about 300,000 elderly people during the past year.

Mrs Chan thanked the Elderly Commission, voluntary agencies and district organizations for their contribution in making the events successful.

"I hope that all parties would join hands with the Government to ensure that the care and respect for the elderly would rollover to the new millennium and continue forever," Mrs Chan said.

END/Saturday, December 18, 1999

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