Tony Lodge is a Council Member of the Bow Group, which is today publishing Telecare – A Crucial Opportunity to help save our health and social care system, an independent analysis written by Professor Sue Yeandle of the University of Leeds. Here he summarises the pamphlet's findings.
It is time to face some urgent truths on the NHS and the way we fund and care for our expanding elderly population. There is a growing cross-party consensus that spending on the NHS and social care, which has more than doubled in the past thirteen years, must become better focused and more controlled as we face a growing older population.
By 2025 the number of people aged 85 or older in England is set to increase by 70%, to nearly two million. By 2020 there will be 50% more people over 65 and 54% more people with dementia than there are now. Already in the 85+ group, more than a third of men and more than half of women live alone - and most have a limiting long-term illness.
On 14 July 2009, the Government went some way to acknowledging the force of these demographic pressures, with the publication of its long-delayed social care Green Paper - but many argue the Government still refrains from taking a clear policy lead.
New independent analysis by the University of Leeds, published by the Bow Group, shows that without urgent action to harness the potential of technology, Britain’s ageing population will place huge, increasing - but in many cases unnecessary - demands on our health and social care system, at the same time as the relative size of the working age population is shrinking.
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