Save our elderly | Senior citizens programmes may merge
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The Ministry of Health and Social Development is considering to merge various senior citizens programmes in the British Virgin Islands.
Chief Social Development Officer Annie Malone-Frett made the announcement when she appeared before the Standing Finance Committee recently.
Her remarks follow an inquiry by Second District Representative Melvin ‘Mitch’ Turnbull on the status of the territory’s senior programmes.
Turnbull said it is imperative to keep the local elderly engaged because they are susceptible to fatal stress and other post-hurricane related deaths.
Currently, there are senior programmes in each district. Malone-Frett said coupled with considerations to merge the programmes, there will be other changes at the various community centres where these senior programmes usually operate.
She said the Social Development Department is assessing the possibility of paying a salary to centre managers and providing them with a ‘stipend’ to run these senior programmes, as opposed to the present arrangement where the senior programmes are run under her department.
Status on centres
In the meantime, Malone-Frett said the 2017 hurricanes wreaked havoc on all the community centres where the senior programmes were held.
As such, she said the Carrot Bay seniors have been operating at the privately owned Seventh-day Adventist Youth Centre and the team from the Brewers Bay community are expected to join them.
In terms of the East End senior programme, Malone-Frett said operations have resumed and close to 20 seniors are currently engaged there.
She also said the Road Town community centre has not yet resumed operations.
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This is just nonsense and another way for you cheap people to save cost…..running a senior programme is the same as running a daycare…..you do not want to over crowd it because u want to be able to properly observe each individual in the event of an emergency. Thats why they be falling down and breaking their necks at the old people home and you guys be giving the family sob stories to cover your a$$es.
EXACTLY! and also the overcrowding of these centres would cause the caretakers to become ‘over-whelmed’ resulting in some of them MISTREATING the seniors. Use the damn money to ensure that all the INDIVIDUAL Centres are up-to-par and fully functional. Don’t Merge, it’s not a good idea.
If only the $7,000,000.00 given away for an invisible airline had been used to properly fund adequate senior care provision instead of this continued neglect of the most vulnerable in our society….