And while this is a clear case of elderly abandonment, it's far from the only one in the country. According to the executive director of Helpage Belize, it's more prevalent than you'd think, and it constitutes elderly abuse. She told us today that the way to help them is to reevaluate the social systems in place to ensure that our senior citizens can be taken care of. That, and sensitizing the public to these issues so that communities can look after the elderly in their neighborhoods, reaching out to social partners if needed. She told us why elderly neglect may be so common in our society.
Ivorine Bulwer - Executive Director, Helpage "The harsh reality too is that older persons have family members and they just decide to abandon them. So clearly why are these things happening? We have got to look at the structures we have in place, we have got to look a social protection, opportunities for housing, opportunities for food, we have got to look at certain support services like BEL offers certain kilowatts to older persons over 2,000 older persons across the country have access to a number of kilowatts of free electricity. We have got to look at other entities, they need to chip in and looking to supporting our older persons, so we got to look at those systems that we have in place, do we have system in place to ensure that our older persons maintain a level of health and wellness. When I look at a situation that you may have gone out there and identified, it certainly need a case study, we need to examine why but I strongly feel that the time for now is to really look at the issues impacting older persons. In the next 30 years there will be more older persons than younger persons."
Courtney Menzies "Is this something that you see often where older persons are left to fend for themselves?"
Ivorine Bulwer "Certainly, it is concerning, it is a concerning issue and so we have to create that level of awareness. Sometimes it may be a behavior that we think it's okay, oh let them stay there, they can sit there and do nothing but quality of life is important throughout the life course, so whether young or old, people must be active, people must be treated with dignity."
Bulwer also said that the elderly must also contend with family members who steal their pension and, in COVID times, social isolation.
