The novel Coronavirus is forcing a lot of us to reconsider the reality of our current healthcare systems. Whether that’s by country or worldwide. Now, with things slowly hitting an apex throughout the world, we all have to look inwards at our own governments and ask the question; “what do we take away from this?”
Earliest on in the pandemic, a lot of things were forgotten, including the medicare focused towards younger AND older citizens. The CARES Act, which is currently a hot topic all on its own, was focused more on financial and business assistance. Healthcare was much more of a secondary concern for the biggest bill pushed through the house.
National Council on Aging
There’s a big problem when over 20 million seniors between the ages of 60 and 75 cannot even support themselves when facing a medical crisis.
Typically, most jobs that offer healthcare benefits do not employ seniors, it makes life doubly hard for seniors to apply and live healthily. Additionally, there is no shortage of seniors that apply for both Medicare and Medigap. Yet they still do not receive the proper care and attention that their age demands.
Seniors Should Receive Priority Testing
COVID has done a lot of damage to nursing homes and senior citizen groups throughout the world. The novel virus attacks respiratory systems harshly, which leads to seniors and preexisting health conditions to be much more devastating.
Despite this fact, testing in the US has been extremely sporadic and targeted more towards essential workers. Which is important in its own right, but it should not have come at the expense of not testing those who have the highest risk associated with the virus itself.
What do we Do?
Ultimately, the sad truth is that we really do not have a strong answer right now. There are certainly solutions, but right now the best we can do is just advocate for more careful consideration in the future.
If/when Coronavirus comes back for a second round, seniors should be considered in the first round of tests.
For more updates on health and senior citizens, check us out here at Scoophash! Leave us a comment and let us know what you think!
