MediaNews editorial
06/05/2009
CONGRESSIONAL HEARINGS going back 30 years have documented that elder abuse is a shameful national epidemic. In recent years, the problem has only gotten worse.
Three times now, the Elder Justice Act, which would adopt much-needed new measures to protect exploited seniors, has died in Congress.
Seniors can no longer afford to wait. It's time now for action.
Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, and Blanche Lincoln, D-Ark., have reintroduced their original bill once again. It currently awaits action in the Senate Finance Committee.
The Elder Justice Act is a smart, comprehensive plan for preventing and detecting elder abuse across the U.S.
First and foremost, it would make combating elder abuse a national priority. That would help to bring the problem, which has largely been a hidden epidemic, into the public spotlight.
The Elder Justice Act would do a number of things.
Most importantly, it would create a stream of dedicated funding through block grants to Adult Protective Services Agencies around the country. These agencies are on the front lines for detecting elder abuse and protecting exploited seniors.
Yet many local adult protective services agencies currently operate on such shoestring budgets their caseloads are off the charts. They're only able to intervene in the most extreme cases of abuse, leaving many at-risk seniors to suffer.
On the legal front, the bill also provides for specialized training for law enforcement and prosecutors who handle elder abuse cases, which hopefully would help remove more elder predators from the streets.
The law would create an Office of Elder Justice to help coordinate local and federal efforts to combat elder abuse. It would also create an Elder Justice Research Center that would provide public education on preventing elder abuse and look at how to implement some of the best practices nationally.
In addition, the bill would help protect residents of long-term care facilities by requiring that employees of nursing homes undergo background checks.
The estimated cost of the bill is $650 million per year, over seven years. The federal government currently spends about $153 million annually to fight elder abuse — a relatively minuscule amount considering that the problem is certain to increase with 76 million Baby Boomers approaching retirement age.
It's estimated that 1 million to 2 million older adults are injured, exploited or otherwise mistreated each year. One in five cases are believed to go unreported.
We cannot continue to turn a blind eye to the abuse of our elders.
It is high time that Congress took the lead in fighting this national scourge.
SOURCE: Tri-Valley Herald - Pleasanton,CA,USA
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To learn more about this bill, please go to 'Elder Justice Coalition' Site
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