#BattleFest2021: Care for the elderly: the forgotten minority?

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CARE FOR THE ELDERLY: THE FORGOTTEN MINORITY?

A new #BattleFest recording from the Battle of Ideas festival 2021:
https://www.battleofideas.org.uk/session/care-for-the-elderly-the-forgotten-minority/

Negative attitudes to the elderly go far beyond financial support. Long before COVID, social policy has been ambivalent about increased longevity. Far from being treated as unalloyed good news, the trend has often been problematised as a demographic time bomb, a financial burden to be paid for by the young and a drain on the NHS. Are these problems solely down to governments? If politicians have out-sourced elderly care, have some families themselves done the same, with Covid only highlighting the underlying weaknesses in intergenerational family bonds? How should we view care of the elderly in the future? What lessons have we learnt from the pandemic?