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

[Futurascope]

Possibly controversial…,

https://www.itv.com/news/2024-05-14/one-in-three-councils-not-confident-they-can-provide-basic-adult-social-care

“The fears about meeting the legal requirements come despite eight out of 10 councils forecasting having to cut spending on other community services such as parks, libraries and leisure centres to try to protect funding”.

So - libraries, leisure centres, parks, all vital for young children, families and others - being closed because the elderly desperately need social care.

As awful as it is for us all individually to lose somebody that we love….. is curing every disease, and having us all live to 100 really a good thing if it is at the expense of quality of life for the rest of society?

Do you have an alternative proposal, OP?

It’s not people living longer that’s the problem. It’s a society set up purely for making the rich richer and people having no ability to stay at home with the young or elderly. It’s the story government stripping public services bare. It’s not old people- it’s greedy people that are the problem, young and old.

So when do you determine the cut off age for treatment of illness? 70yrs old and too bad? You want people unable to retire until 67 and then be denied medical care?

Funny how other EU countries seem to be able to care for their ageing population.

No, we just need to structure society better so that the elderly are adequately looked after. The system doesn’t work atm.

It's that although (until recently) life expectancy has risen, healthy life expectancy has not, so we have lots of people living many years in poor health. This means health and social care costs have risen dramatically.

Completely agree. Quality over quantity I say; the tax burden for keeping people alive those few extra years (usually with little to no quality of life) means that everyone is struggling so much more than they might if we drew the line a bit earlier. The moment I have to rely on anyone else is the moment I’ll be hopping on the first plane to Dignitas.

It’s not people being old that’s the problem, it’s people being old and in ill health. If as a society we put more effort into promoting better health as people age they could live longer without needing more care.

I don’t agree with pitting one set of vulnerable people against another. It should not be a case of stop funding the elderly in preference of children. That is a non starter morally but also a difficult stance to defend as elderly have been a substantial contributor. However I do agree that there does need to be consideration of what is best for a patient on a more holistic level rather than just living longer. People should have the opportunity to be more engaged in their health including treatment. Many people would not choose to live a life with low quality of life but that shouldn’t be broad brush.

You are right but it's a very unpalatable thing to say.

The world is doomed when we finally find a cure for death.

What with this post and all the recent disability benefit bashing ones, I am getting increasingly concerned at the direction of travel in this country. It's all feeling rather dystopian round mumsnet of late.

I agree. Carousel is the only way.

What if you have relatives that love you and value you and beg you not to?

Social care funding has lagged behind everything else for years - NHS may be underfunded but that’s visible; state-funded social care is something experienced by a minority of people and by few of the kind of people who make funding decisions. It would be perfectly possible to increase social care funding as long as you’re prepared to pay more tax and/or reduce spending on other things like defence or infrastructure.

That said I’m hoping for a quick death at 85 and 90 at the latest - I work with the elderly and haven’t seen many 90+ whose life I would want, even those living well for their age.

@TheCountessofFitzdotterel No to what? No one is advocating euthanasia; only not artificially prolonging life.

If voluntary euthanasia were an option the problem would be cured overnight. Not everyone wants to eke out every single second. Obviously it's easier to decide to die than to let a loved one go so I'd like it to be n option for couples too even if one were in reasonable health.

This is a problem across Europe and the rest of the world. We are outliving the capacity of our societies to support us and we act like the impossible is a basic right.

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 .......

@ChristmasGutPunch Hear hear

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.

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

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 !

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.

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.

No not at all! I just feel genuinely concerned for my children’s quality of life as they get older and for their own children in the future. The quality and availability of pretty much every public service is significantly lower than in the past.

I am not a Conservative voter and am angry about a lot that they are responsible for over the last decade. But I also wonder whether labour can change anything - there is still not enough money raised through taxes/NI to support the social care needs - despite the fact that our tax burden is higher than it has ever been.

My 12 year old asked me earlier how she could ever afford a house when she is an adult. Says she wants to be a teacher but this won’t earn enough to buy a house (she’s right). In the past quality of life increased with generations; certainly not anymore 😕

You won’t be hopping anywhere at that stage.

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.