Delays and inaction by the Australian Government have got aged care to where it is today: in crisis. The Australian Government should break with this tradition of prevarication and immediately release the Aged Care Royal Commission’s report on COVID-19 in aged care.
Maybe one-off payments, maybe new pension indexation mechanisms, maybe unrestricted supply of aged care, the 6 October Budget will have lots of things in it.
Dying isn’t as easy as it used to be. When someone dies up to forty government and private organisations need to be notified, not to mention online accounts needing to be closed. There's a scheme to do it all in one fell swoop.
The aged care industry has for decades resisted meaningful monitoring of aged care quality, which shows in the ridiculously vague aged care standards the industry must comply with. The industry is now complaining how onerous it is to demonstrate compliance with the new, vague standards that came in 2019, but they also resist the replacement of standards with a suite of meaningful quality indicators that are based on information providers already collect as part of and during the course of normal operations.
Finally the Government is publishing information about COVID-19 in nursing homes across Australia. That's six months into the pandemic. But the report the Government put out tries to spin the mismanagement of the pandemic in nursing homes as .... a win!
WANT to be in control of your Home Care Package and decide who comes into your home? Care brokers are not the answer, negotiating with bona fide approved Home Care Package providers is.
Use rounding and rental affordability for some people on social security is nil, says a report by Anglicare.
Smart energy meter, it sounds like lower power bills, but the full price may be paid for in loss of privacy.
How much is home care allowed to cost? More or less or the same as residential aged care? The Aged Care Royal Commission says: the same, but CPSA disagrees.
This week's Poet's Corner is occupied by Victor Borg with a sweeping review of COVID-19, inflation, pension indexation and .... ducks! All in just four lines, too.
Back in 2000 pensioners started to receive compensation for the increase in the cost of living caused by the GST. So, the question is: twenty years on, does the compo still cover the GST that pensioners pay or is the system letting them down?
By some reports from pensioners unable to pay for lunch in cold hard cash, cash has become obsolete, so how can it be that cashless transactions hitting an all-time high happens at the same time that the Reserve Bank of Australia was compelled by demand to print and distribute billions and billions of dollars in polymer bank notes?
What do you make of an aged care sector that has turned crying poor into a fine art but that is set to spend an unspecified amount on a PR campaign to explain how good they are despite having no money to do a good job? Truth-poor?
Electricity prices are on their way down thanks to renewables, but gas bills will remain high as an agreement between Government and gas producers proves to be ineffective.
A research report on aged care quality indicators makes it clear that Australia could move immediately from the wishy-washy, vague aged care standards it uses at the moment to an independent, transparent, routine monitoring and public reporting system.
UNHYGIENIC and crowded, traditional older-style boarding houses are COVID-19 death traps. Almost 1,500 residents (11 per cent) are aged 60 and over.
Edward Black, another bard in CPSA's stable of poets-in-residence to mix a mataphor, reflects on skin.
AUSTRALIANS over the age of 75 have on average twenty-four decayed, missing or filled teeth. COVID-19 risk is no excuse to not have them checked.
The Australian Government has made changes to the Medicare Benefits Schedule that will mean pensioners reliant on Medicare may be out of pocket if they need a common heart test.
There's something yukky about the aged care sector's sanctimonious calls for immediate hospitalisation of COVID-19 positive residents, but the sector has form.