To think that people living longer is making quality of life for everyone worse?

The premise of this thread is dubious at best.

You didn’t answer my question though. At what age do you propose be the cut off for medical treatment?

Are you volunteering to die @Futurascope to give the rest of us a better chance?

I agree with previous posters that more money for social care might help. By I agree with the OP and I don’t think money cures the entire issue.

It isn’t exactly a problem a such, more a side effect of improvements in life expectancy and in curing/improving some types of illness.

From my experience in the last decade of life, assuming that is sometime from age 75 onwards, people need not only significant care that can be paid for/bought, but also significant help that can’t be bought. Companionship, sympathy with ailments, help with banking/downsizing etc, immobility leading to family needing to visit rather than the relative travelling etc etc.

And that is even if they stay reasonably healthy in mind and body. If they don’t there are hospital trips, discharge coordination, late night phone calls etc etc.

Pointing it out isn’t asking for a problem to be ‘solved’. It is akin to saying ‘isn’t life with toddlers hard work’.

Yeah, you might change that view when you get there

I am 33. I rely on my family daily. Should I be written off? My 87 yo nan manages on her own. Even walks to get her own shopping

You do realise it’s not just old people that need social care support?

What about young adults with Down’s syndrome, Autism or cerebral palsy that need supported living. Are you suggesting we get rid of those people as well? Too much of a drain on ‘your’ society?

The councils only pay for social care if the person has less than 23 thousand in assets, I believe?

So actually rich elderly people aren't paid for by the council?

So it's not so much people living longer and in poorer health but the family caring system falling apart due to women working and so those who can't pay for care the council has to.

The problem is systemic underfunding of care and underfunding of health (causing more problems in later life), not ”all the unreasonable old people staying alive for too long”.

Also that there was no shift in care funding. It used to be the case that middle aged women stayed home and took on the care burden for free. I don’t expect most people want to go back to that but, in increasing economic activity for that age group, and therefore the tax take, there has not been a corresponding increase in the care budget.

AKA women’s contributions are always undervalued.

@TheCountessofFitzdotterel Oh apologies, I misunderstood. I think I would do it anyway - I couldn’t bear to be reliant on anyone else.

A lot of the adult social care expense on our council tax actually goes towards schools ECHP students.

Recent figures are showing a stagnation and possibly decline in life expectancy.

An increase in tax for all and a general shake up of the system would help towards our services and education

Saying people are living too long it’s all their fault my life’s crap is disgusting

And by the time they find themselves in that state, they will be reliant on other people to get them there, no doubt.

Agree...it's very easy to say oh I don't want to live once I get to a certain stage...I'll take myself off to dignitas. I think the reality is a lot more difficult. Humans survival instinct is strong.

It is not just some elderly people having their lives artificially prolonged though, is it? So why center on them as a problem?

The moment I have to rely on anyone else is the moment I’ll be hopping on the first plane to Dignitas.

This is said so much on here, I wonder when the time actually comes though how many really would hop on the first plane, it’s easy to say this when it’s not your current reality.

Come back and ask us that when you're 80 and ill and people expect you to do the decent thing and die to make room for younger folks.

You won’t be hopping anywhere at that stage.

We are all doomed then as carousel was age 30 ish ?

What about the mentally disabled? The ones who cannot do anything for themselves? This is my relative, she is about 17, is as small as a 5 year old and will have a normal lifespan according to drs.

I sort of agree and was thinking something similar myself recently.
And I have 2 grandparents still living over 100.
My biggest issue is that we’ve become quite good at fixing the physical body diseases and illnesses etc but have made very little progress with issues such as dementia and Alzheimer’s. I visit my grandmother in her very nice care home and pray I’m dead before I reach the stage of most of the people in there. It’s awful.

Absolutely nothing wrong with people living longer and equally ,absolutely nothing wrong with younger people being kept alive if they have a good quality of life .
Am not sure what your point is TBH !

You said you would be hopping on the plane to Dignitas.

Just to put some figures in place that it is not just 'old' people who need social care so no-one should be suggesting that it is the elderly alone who are diverting support from the rest of the population.

After a fall in 2020/21 during Covid-19, when requests from older people fell sharply, requests have returned to the general trend seen since 2015/16 of increasing demand for social care services.

This is likely to reflect both an increasing older population and increasing disability among working-age adults: 14.8 million working-age adults in the UK reported a long-term health condition in 2022/23, compared to 11.7 million in 2013/14, and 4.0 million people reported a severe disability, up from 2.9 million in 2013/14.

@ChristmasGutPunch Hear hear

Councils cannot afford to fulfill their legal responsibilities because they are not given enough money in central grants to do this. New responsibilities are piled on them with no government support.

So .... perhaps, since I am retired, I had better just fuck off and die .......