KOREA: More Seniors Live Alone, Die Unnoticed

SEOUL (The Hankyoreh), February 28, 2007: The Government of Korea says it does not have adequate budgeting, nor enough staff to address problem of senior citizens living alone. Many die unnoticed. Mr. Kim, 65, was found dead in a room of his house in Haengdang-dong, Seongdong-gu, on February 26 by one of his nephews, who had not been able to contact him for a long time. Opening the door to his uncle’s room, the nephew found Kim’s badly decomposed body. According to the police, Kim died nearly two months prior, considering the condition of his body and his mobile phone conversation records. Kim had lived alone since his divorce 25 years ago. Due to family conflicts, he was estranged from his two sons. His sister said she had tried to call Kim several times, but got no answer. For more than two months after his death, nobody visited Kim’s house. Since the neighborhood where he was living is slated for redevelopment, most of his neighbors moved out in November last year, so no one was around to check up on him. With an increase in the number of seniors living alone, state and local governments and the police have taken measures to prevent unnoticed deaths, but these efforts have failed due to a shortage of funding and personnel. In 2005, the National Police Agency (NPA) introduced a program for aged people living alone. Under the program, if there is a request from the children of such an elderly person, the police would visit those seniors to confirm their safety. Police officers also have visited seniors living in solitude when making the rounds on their beat. However, as of January, only about 50,000 out of the nation’s 880,000 seniors living alone were receiving such police visits. Sim Il-gwang of the NPA said, "The program is aimed at preventing those persons from being neglected for a long time, but it has its limits due to a manpower shortage." The Ministry of Health and Welfare has not found a solution to the problem. The beneficiaries of the government system to guarantee minimum living expenses are taken care of the local governments, but other seniors are exempted from the protection. As lone deaths of the aged have become a social problem, the Ministry of Health and Welfare has instructed the provincial government to establish a center to support lone seniors. However, due to the problem of budgeting, there are only about 100 such centers across the nation. A new program slated to begin in June this year, however, will hire about 7,000 counselors - one for every 150 elderly persons nationwide - to take care of those aged individuals living solo, said Lee Sang-im, an official of the ministry. "The ministry will recruit the counselors from April and they will begin to investigate the realities of the lone seniors from June," added Lee. Copyright © Global Action on Aging