Not long ago, in the temporary placement of a simple boarding house, Kunming Zhiqing Apartment for the Elderly held a lively collective birthday for 48 elderly people, and Xiao Chaoqing, a war veteran, also spent his 100th birthday. The social volunteers who came to participate in the birthday event sang the birthday song and ate the birthday cake together with more than 200 elderly people in the apartment to “get some joy”.
Looking at the smiling faces of the old people, Duan Lingying, the director of Kunming Zhiqing Apartment for the Aged, had a sour and sweet heart; for 10 years, the apartment had brought peace of mind to countless old people. However, two years ago, due to urban renovation and demolition, the nursing home was moved out of the demolition several times in a limited time, Duan Lingying reported around begging for a solution, but there has been no news. At present, the temporary resettlement time will soon pass, and the nursing home will again face the embarrassing situation of relocation.
The city is getting bigger and bigger, the nursing home is moving further and further away
In 2002, Duan Lingying used all her savings to found the Kunming Zhiqing Nursing Home with 3 compounds and 1020 beds, which became the largest private nursing home in Kunming. In the past 10 years, it has won the honors of “China’s Top 100 Outstanding Senior Care Service Organizations”, “China Senior Care Industry Benchmark Demonstration Unit”, “China Cultural Senior Care and Health Demonstration Base” and “Standing Director Unit of China Social Welfare Association”.
In 2009, Kunming implemented old city renovation, Zhiqing Senior Apartment was included in the scope of demolition, and the senior apartment was asked to move out in a limited time. Without receiving the full compensation, Duan Lingying sold her own house and her children’s house and mortgaged her brother and sister’s house to build a simple boarding house in a nearby small island village, and moved more than 400 elderly people there as a temporary resettlement for two years. At the end of 2012, the Kunming Zhiqing Senior Residence celebrated its 10th anniversary in a simple room that was “not warm in winter, not cool in summer, and not well insulated”.
In order to properly solve the problem of demolition and relocation of Kunming Zhiqing Senior Apartments, the district government where the nursing home is located sent a letter to arrange for “the former Kunming Electrical Factory Children’s School to be used as the land for the relocation of Kunming Zhiqing Senior Apartments”, but almost two years later, the relevant departments said they “did not know about it and could not solve it. “, Duan Lingying’s wish to rebuild the nursing home was again put on hold. Right now, the first hospital is surrounded by broken walls and is facing demolition. The relevant departments originally promised to give Duan Lingying 7 million yuan in compensation for demolition and relocation, but only 3.56 million yuan has been given so far.
The director of Kunming Good Time Nursing Home, Li Yonghong, feels more “cold” than Duan Lingying. The nursing home is renting the resale of the rented land, after being forcibly demolished, even the identity of the body that can get compensation is not clear, into the endless tug of war.
After three moves, the old folks had to move to Hama’s village in the far suburbs of Kunming, where they lived in the reception of an unused decorating company. 3 moves in 4 years, the furniture was rotten, all stacked in a makeshift shed in the yard.
Due to the limited room and space, there are only 37 elderly people left here, from several hundred originally. Most of the remaining elderly are disabled, some are paralyzed in bed, some in wheelchairs, some suffering from congenital intellectual disabilities, including three elderly people Li Yonghong saw in the newspaper and television vagrant elderly, free of charge to take in.
Grandpa Wu, who is in a wheelchair, misses the old nursing home: “In the past, each room had an independent bathroom, tiled walls, wooden floors, and bathtubs. There were various exercise areas outside. Now this place is too small, there is nothing.”
”I didn’t get a single penny of the compensation promised by the government. I sold my house and rely on loans to maintain the current operation.” Li Yonghong said.
Meanwhile, the Spring City Home for the Aged in Yangma Village, Kunming, is now in ruins, after the nursing home experienced water and electricity cuts as well as forced demolition.
At 7:40 a.m. on Dec. 4, 2012, director Shi Zhengxia received a phone call that “the old people’s home was now being demolished,” and “was confused, how could it be demolished, no one had approached us for consultation.” 20 minutes later, Shi Zhengxia and her son rushed to the scene. “At that time, I saw two excavators were demolishing the office building of the nursing home. My son and I went up to block it, and there was medical equipment, office supplies, furniture and other things inside.” Shi Zhengxia felt the seriousness of the matter and really encountered forced demolition. “That’s when hundreds of ‘unidentified’ people came around and pushed me and my son ‘what do you have to say, go out and say’.”
”Our home is not a nail household, why no one has ever talked to us about the demolition and compensation?” Shi Zhengxia contacted government departments at all levels, real estate developers, government hotlines, and public security bureaus, “but there is still no response.” (Regret!!!)
The policy of encouraging private welfare nursing homes is not implemented
This summer, most cities across the country continue to high temperature, was named “the first batch of thirty foreign pension tourism designated units” of the good time nursing home received dozens of phone calls every day across the country, “but our nursing home space is limited, have turned down one by one. ” Li Yonghong said helplessly.
This year is Shenzhen’s Zou Suqin and his partner spent the sixth summer vacation in Kunming. Spring city of Kunming as one of the country’s suitable for living in the city of old age, every year will welcome a part of the elderly outside the province, where they choose a nursing home, live for a few months, summer leisure, this “migratory bird type of retirement” is quite popular. But Zou Suqin, 68, wonders if the Kunming Zhiqing Senior Residence will still exist the next time she visits.
”The city is getting bigger and more beautiful, but the elderly are moving further and further away. Li Yonghong said, “Many documents encourage private capital to run orphanages, but there are no specific rules for implementation. For example, nursing homes can enjoy the policy of low-interest loans, but when our nursing home was in great difficulty, many banks did not lend to us, and I had to find relatives to make guaranteed loans.”
Duan Lingying had the same experience. “Many government staff treat private welfare institutions as ‘outsiders’ and do not care, support, provide services or implement policies.” She said.
Running a private nursing home has left Duan Lingying, a 60-year-old woman, physically and mentally exhausted.
”I struggled to run the nursing home for 10 years, put in more than 13 million yuan, and now I can only receive the promised compensation of 7 million yuan, while the actual arrival of only 3.56 million yuan at present.” She said, “I am bent on the nursing care business and helping others to retire, but in the end, my own retirement is a problem, who will help me to retire?”
The plight of these nursing homes has attracted the attention of Zhang Yanping, a representative of the Yunnan Provincial People’s Congress. In this year’s “two sessions” in Yunnan Province, Zhang Yanping submitted a proposal to “protect the rights and interests of social power institutions to deal with the arrival of an aging society. The proposal pointed out that, at present, “the social forces in Kunming city to run the elderly institutions, there are generally ‘large investment, slow results’, ‘operating difficulties, difficult to continue’ and other problems. The people in charge of these social institutions are in the situation of running around between various government agencies at all levels without any way to ask for help”, and hope that the government can “solve the problems that need to be solved for a number of social institutions such as Kunming Zhiqing Senior Citizen Residence by a deadline”.
On April 16 this year, Kunming Civil Affairs Bureau gave a reply, saying: “In recent years, Kunming City has increased urban renovation and construction efforts, some facilities that do not meet the planning or have not been approved by the planning to demolish and relocate, some private institutions for the elderly are also in the scope of relocation, such as Zhiqing Senior Apartments, Good Time Nursing Home, etc.. Although they started earlier in the construction of senior care facilities, they all started their senior care facilities by renting sites or leasing properties, so there is no way back once they are demolished and relocated.
Even the compensation they could not form the main body of compensation, which led them to relocate several times with great difficulties. The Zhiqing Senior Apartments and the Good Time Nursing Home involved have reflected their practical difficulties to the district government where they are located. Although they encountered heavy difficulties in relocation, they are currently responsible for the care of the elderly in different scales or ways.”
The reply said that the Xishan District government and its relevant departments are actively coordinating the land for Zhiqing Senior Apartments, and the relevant departments in the Panlong District also said that they are implementing the specific handling of the demolition and relocation in accordance with the policy. “At present the good time nursing home is actively coordinating in Fumin to build a leisure retirement base related matters, for which we will actively do a good job of coordination, so that the relocated elderly institutions as soon as possible to start construction.”
Public nursing institutions “a bed is hard to find”
However, from April to date, Duan Lingying still has not received any news. Every day, she has to think about which department to run in order to make the nursing home quickly built up. Sometimes she also persuades the elderly to go to other nursing homes, but most nursing homes do not have beds.
Information shows that as of 2012, Kunming has a total of 870,000 registered elderly people over 60 years old, accounting for 16 percent of the city’s registered population, of which 120,000 are over 80 years old, accounting for 15 percent of the total elderly population. According to statistics, the number of empty nesters in Kunming has reached 230,000, accounting for 26% of the total elderly population, and the number of disabled or semi-disabled elderly people has reached 190,000, accounting for 22% of the elderly population.
However, in the face of the huge elderly population, Kunming’s elderly institutions are stretched to the limit.
According to the data, there are only 16,000 beds in 119 various elderly institutions in Kunming, with only 18 beds per 1,000 elderly people. Most of these institutions have few beds, low construction standards, shortage of facilities and equipment, and most of the elderly services stay in basic life care. For example, the Kunming Social Welfare Institute has 1200 beds, if the elderly want to move in, they need to register in advance, and some can’t wait for a year or two; Kunming Evergreen Senior Apartments, with 400 beds, is currently a better public nursing institution in Kunming, and the price of beds in ordinary rooms ranges from 1100 to 1400 yuan/month/bed, but the beds have been in short supply.
Among the 119 nursing homes in Kunming, 46 are privately run nursing homes. However, from 2009 to the present, in the urbanization construction, some relocated, some can not continue to operate due to the lack of compensation, only more than 20 of the 46 nursing homes remain. Of the 24 private nursing homes located in the main city, 14 have been demolished.
”Public nursing institutions are far from being able to meet the rapidly growing needs of the elderly, while private nursing institutions are struggling because no one pays attention to them. The ‘debt’ of the elderly care business is growing.” Duan Lingying said.
In this regard, the Social and Legal Affairs Committee of the Yunnan Provincial Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference also expressed deep concern in a special research report on the aging problem in Yunnan: “Yunnan Province has entered the aging society for 10 years, but the whole society is not sufficiently aware of the seriousness of the problem, and most of the countermeasures lack foresight, global and systematic. Most local decision-making departments do not put the development of the elderly service industry in its rightful place, and do not include it in the local economic and social development planning, nor do they have a special plan for the development of the elderly service industry; there is no research and evaluation on the seriousness of the aging problem, the countermeasures and development prospects. The relevant departments respond passively in their work. Most of the people feel that the work of aging has nothing to do with them.”
The existing elderly institutions in Yunnan Province are not only small in number but also unreasonably distributed. At present, 80% of the population is in the rural areas, while 80% of the elderly institutions are in the cities, a highly unbalanced development.
According to the CPPCC members’ survey, 2/3 of the province’s states, cities and counties (cities and districts) do not have a public nursing institution yet, and even fewer private nursing institutions. The existing institutions are very small. Members saw in the survey, Wenshan Prefecture, Maguan County, a small dam of old people’s home, living conditions are very simple, where the focus of care for the disabled elderly 11, three orphans. Two of the houses are very dark, damp, completely non-residential conditions. “Not to mention the elderly, is a strong young people live in, but also will certainly live a disease.”
This report points out that at present, “the socialization of the elderly work gap is large, the current work of the elderly is basically the civil affairs department singing a monologue”, “private elderly institutions are difficult to get the same treatment as public elderly institutions. The government gives little direct funding to non-profit institutions”, “the lack of supporting policies and implementation methods for land use, financing and market access affects the enthusiasm of social forces to invest in elderly care, forming a big contrast with other provinces and regions.”
When can the “love canteen” get love help
Wang Lanlan, a 46-year-old laid-off woman worker, has been commemorating the death of her daughter with her charitable actions.
In 2005, Wang Lanlan’s 15-year-old daughter passed away due to uremia. Before her death, her daughter wrote a sentence behind a photo: “Mom, please don’t forget me. May you be happy every day!”
This heartbreaking photo made Wang Lanlan, who lived alone in a low-cost housing complex in Kunming’s Happy Home, tear up every day. In order to honor her daughter and to give herself the confidence to live, Wang Lanlan collected a large amount of clothes and gave them to children in remote and poor mountainous areas at her own expense.
In October 2012, she used her savings to rent a store on the first floor of the exit of the community and set up a “love canteen”. In October 2012, Wang Lanlan rented a shop on the first floor of the exit of the district with her little savings and set up a “love canteen” to cook for the elderly. She also recruited 15 unpaid volunteers to take turns to participate in the service. The canteen provides lunch and dinner at a price of 3 yuan per meal, with three dishes and one soup, one meat and two vegetables, for 180 yuan per month. More than 100 elderly people in the community began to eat on a permanent basis.
Such a meal rate soon made the “Love Canteen” unable to make ends meet.
Wang Lanlan made a statistic: in November 2012, the meal income was 13,600 yuan, while the expenditure was 25,813.50 yuan, a loss of 12,213.50 yuan; in December, the income was 14,620 yuan, the expenditure was 26,885.00 yuan, a loss of 13,285 yuan. The cost of each meal in the canteen is $5.70. And the elderly who attended the meals paid only $3.00 per meal. Each meal needs to be subsidized by 2.7 yuan, which does not include some other necessary cost expenses. In addition, there are 10 special-needs seniors who do not pay for the meals.
Although Wang Lanlan’s good deeds have received help and support from some departments, communities, enterprises and all walks of life, it is still necessary for Wang Lanlan to “go around” and donate money steadily to run the canteen.
”From the operation of the canteen, it is difficult to sustain the canteen in the long run.” A staff member of the happy community said.
The person in charge of the Social and Legal Affairs Committee of the Yunnan Provincial Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) (referred to as the Social and Legal Affairs Committee) pointed out that at present, community pensions are facing a grim reality. Yunnan province has a total of 1121 urban communities, many state-owned enterprises retirees have been transferred to community management, and some retirees are gradually integrated into the community, but the status quo is that most urban communities do not have elderly service facilities, home care services are only carried out sporadically in a few communities, the vast majority of communities do not have the conditions to carry out home care services, while rural home care relying on community services or blank.
According to the relevant departments, the elderly population in Kunming is growing at a rate of 3.5% per year, and it is expected that by 2015, the city’s household elderly population will be close to 1 million.
”The aging industry has a broad space for development and market demand, at present, the average annual demand of China’s elderly market is 600 billion yuan, but the annual products that can be provided for the elderly is less than 100 billion yuan, and there is a huge gap between supply and demand.” An expert from the Social Law Committee of the Yunnan Provincial Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference said that Yunnan has a unique climate, ecological environment and conditions suitable for the elderly to take care of themselves. The development of the elderly service industry should be incorporated into the socio-economic development plan as soon as possible, and preferential policies should be introduced to encourage all kinds of organizations, enterprises and individuals to engage in elderly services, and support should be given in land, licensing, taxation, credit and other aspects.
At the same time, the government should change the single practice of only investing in public elderly institutions in the past in terms of capital investment, and take the form of subsidies to guide social forces to participate in the elderly service industry.