An alliance of civic groups yesterday urged the Ministry of Health and Welfare to re-evaluate long-term care workers’ payment standards and retainment measures before launching the Long-Term Care 3.0 Policy next year.
The Taiwan Home Service Strategic Alliance and Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Lin Yue-chin (林月琴) held a news conference at the Legislative Yuan, saying that they are concerned that the increase in the number of long-term care workers cannot keep up with the growth of long-term care dependents.
Since the Taiwan’s long-term care program was first launched in 2016, the yearly budget has increased by about 18 times, and the number of long-term care dependents and care centers have also increased significantly, Lin said.
Photo: Fang Pin-chao, Taipei Times
Government statistics show that as of the end of October, Taiwan’s population of elderly people (those aged 65 years or older) has exceeded 4.65 million, and ministry data show that the estimated number of people who need long-term care services this year is about 900,000.
However, the number of long-term care workers only increased from about 25,000 in 2016 to about 100,000 this year, Lin said.
If the number of long-term care workers cannot keep up with care dependents, care quality would have to be sacrificed, and workers could leave the field due to stress caused by overwork, she said.
The ministry should re-evaluate its payment standards for long-term care workers and measures to retain workers before launching the next phase of the national long-term care policy to ensure its sustainability, she added.
Alliance chairwoman Tu Hsin-ning (涂心寧) said the current payment standards have not been adjusted for eight years, and with rapidly increasing demand, the burden on in-home caregivers has been continuously increasing.
Some in-home caregivers told the alliance that they once had been responsible for five to six families at a time, but the average number of families they took care of last year was 10.8, she said.
In one case, an in-home caregiver reported that they had to visit 11 families a day, and they were so busy that they hardly had time to drink water, she said.
While experienced workers are quitting their jobs due to physical exhaustion and burnout, young people are afraid to take these jobs, she said.
The alliance urged the government to re-evaluate the workers’ payment standard, which it said should keep up with rising prices, and improve their working conditions to retain current workers, attract new ones, and avoid the Long-Term Care 3.0 plan becoming crippled due to a shortage of workers.
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