Shal­iza?Has­sanali

Phys­i­cal, ver­bal and sex­u­al abuse of the el­der­ly are on the rise.For di­rec­tor of the Di­vi­sion of Age­ing Dr Jen­nifer Rouse, the sta­tis­tics are wor­ry­ing, and she plead­ed with cit­i­zens to help pro­tect, look out and care for the coun­try's most vul­ner­a­ble group, which is rapid­ly grow­ing in num­bers.

Yes­ter­day, as the Min­istry of the Peo­ple and So­cial De­vel­op­ment held a World El­der Abuse Aware­ness Ex­po at the Cen­tre of Ex­cel­lence, Ma­coya, which con­tin­ues to­day, Rouse said abuse of the el­der­ly was climb­ing.The ex­po seeks to raise aware­ness of the mis­treat­ment and ne­glect of old­er peo­ple and the in­ter­ven­tions that could change at­ti­tudes and be­hav­iours in so­ci­ety.

Rouse showed sta­tis­tics col­lect­ed from the Crime and Prob­lem Analy­sis Branch of the T&T Po­lice Ser­vice, which re­vealed abuse among peo­ple over the age of 60 was on the rise.She pro­duced da­ta which showed there were 243 cas­es of as­sault by beat­ing in 2013 when com­pared to 192 re­ports in 2012.This fig­ure rep­re­sent­ed a 27 per cent in­crease, Rouse said.

Forty-one re­ports of ver­bal abuse/ob­scene lan­guage were made in 2012, where­as 44 were record­ed in 2013–a sev­en per cent in­crease.In 2013 there were six cas­es of sex­u­al of­fences as op­posed to five the year be­fore, which showed a 20 per cent hike.From 2010 to 2013, Rouse said, there were 89 mur­ders of cit­i­zens 60 years and over.

In 2010, 24 mur­ders were record­ed. The fol­low­ing year, the fig­ure dropped to 18. There was a spike in 2013 with 30 mur­ders, where­as last year record­ed its low­est with 17."To say the min­istry has an ac­cu­rate fig­ure, we don't, be­cause a lot of cas­es are un­der­re­port­ed. But what we are see­ing from the oth­er agen­cies like the po­lice...the fig­ures are in­creas­ing. It's a grow­ing phe­nom­e­non we have to wres­tle and grap­ple with."

The min­istry al­so com­piles sta­tis­tics on abuse through its Old­er Per­sons In­for­ma­tion Cen­tre at 800-6742."The calls have been com­ing in."On Wednes­day, Rouse said there were eight types of abuse–fi­nan­cial, prop­er­ty, sex­u­al, phys­i­cal, emo­tion­al, ver­bal, psy­cho­log­i­cal and self-ne­glect.Based on re­ports re­ceived at her of­fice, Rouse said fi­nan­cial topped the list, fol­lowed by prop­er­ty, ver­bal and phys­i­cal abuse.

Rouse said many of the re­ports in­volved nom­i­nees swin­dling un­sus­pect­ing pen­sion­ers of their $3,000 month­ly cheques.She said prop­er­ty abuse was al­so in­creas­ing, as the el­der­ly were forced to sign over their pala­tial or up­scale prop­er­ties to fam­i­ly mem­bers."Af­ter this is done, the el­der­ly per­son is put in­to a (se­nior cit­i­zens') home while the rel­a­tive takes pos­ses­sion of the home."

She said in most cas­es, an el­der­ly per­son who is abused did not have the free­dom to com­plain or sub­mit a re­port."Some don't know what to do. They feel im­po­tent. It's about not leav­ing them be­hind and mak­ing them feel mar­gin­alised or os­tracised. We have to keep them in the fold."Soon, Rouse said, se­nior cit­i­zens would be taught how to send a text mes­sage us­ing cell phones to some­one they could trust or the min­istry.

Rouse said she heard a voice record­ing of a rel­a­tive telling a se­nior cit­i­zen to hur­ry up and die be­cause she was a nui­sance."We al­so know for a fact that some homes de­ny them med­ica­tion. Even fam­i­ly mem­bers are guilty of do­ing this."The min­istry is cur­rent­ly try­ing to amend the Homes for Old­er Per­sons Act 2009, Rouse said.

"Rather than get the bill pro­claimed just for a hand­ful of peo­ple, it is bet­ter that we do the amend­ments and in­sert a new text where it would not on­ly be for homes for the aged, but all care fa­cil­i­ties, which is what we are pur­su­ing right now."In the leg­is­la­tion, Rouse said, there would be sum­ma­ry and in­dictable of­fences that car­ry a two-year jail term and fines of $25,000 and $50,000.

"That will be the first of its kind. As it stands, with­out that leg­is­la­tion be­ing pro­claimed, it means the homes for the aged will have to fall un­der the Hos­pi­tals Act which comes un­der the Min­istry of Health. Once the leg­is­la­tion kicks in, all homes will have to be li­cenced.There are 157 homes for the aged, of which 40 per cent are un­reg­is­tered, Rouse said.

Rouse said while so­cial work­ers abroad are giv­en li­cences to op­er­ate and have the pow­er to re­move an el­der­ly per­son from harm's way, "we don't have that yet."-She said what was need­ed was a more "struc­tured and in­te­grat­ed ap­proach" from all min­istries to help pro­tect the el­der­ly, since there were a va­ri­ety of is­sues that hin­dered ef­forts to as­sist the el­der­ly.Are these is­sues tak­ing too long to be ad­dressed?"How long is long? Every­thing will hap­pen at an ap­point­ed time."