Boomers have only themselves to blame

The crisis that hit Canada's long-term care homes during the COVID-19 pandemic is what happens when an aging population runs into ill-prepared institutions. Too bad we didn't learn from it.

The crisis erupted because too few resources had been put into caring for the aged. Governments saw the elderly as important, but not a priority. Facilities were inadequate, staff members were underpaid and often poorly treated, money was tight, administrators were iffy and emergency procedures proved grossly inadequate for the wave of infections that hit them.

The result: according to the Canadian Institute for Health Information, long-term care residents accounted for three per cent of all COVID cases, but 43 per cent of deaths. This is a worthwhile figure to keep in mind while considering the latest census figures from Statistics Canada. Canadians over 85 represent one of the fastest-growing groups in the country. Between 2016 and 2021, the population of over85s grew by 12 per cent.

There are twice as many over-85s as there were at the turn of the century, and the numbers aren't about to slow down despite the obvious fact that this is a very old group of people. By 2046, the number of Canadians over 85 is projected to triple. The ranks of seniors aged 65 and older is increasing six times faster than children aged zero to 14.

Authorities have been warned for decades that baby boomers would hit this juncture, moving through their retirement years in one great lump just like they did through every other stage of aging since they started discovering puberty in the swinging '60s. Paul McCartney turns 80 in June, by the way.

Are we ready for it? Of course not. Just because governments were given 30 or 40 years of advance notice doesn't mean they actually did anything about it. That was evident when the pandemic arrived and desperate families discovered the care they thought they'd arranged for their aged loved ones was often a mirage. There they were, standing outside windows in the cold, waving pathetically at parents and grandparents locked inside as the virus raged from room to room, leaving a trail of death in its wake.

Ontario and Quebec, the two biggest provinces, were the worst hit and are still scrambling to adjust. In last week's budget, Ontario Finance Minister Peter Bethlenfalvy pledged $1 billion over three years for home care, and a tax credit for related expenses.

Assuming seniors buy their own walkers, wheelchairs, bed rails, oxygen and a way to get up the stairs — which is a stretch considering the plan is limited to incomes below $65,000 — they can get up to 25 per cent back, to a maximum of $1,500. Richer Canadians get more than three times that from Ottawa just for buying an electric car.

Maybe it's a nasty thing to say, but it's tempting to suggest today's governments find themselves strapped for the cash to care for boomers because boomers spent so much of their lives running up gigantic government deficits. The decades between 1970 and today are one long run of growing shortfalls, with each new record dumped into an ever-expanding swamp of debt that will now be passed on to a younger generation that finds itself stuck with the bill for its parents' spending spree.

The one break in the chain occurred in the mind-'90s, when a credit crunch forced Ottawa to slash spending and show a measure of prudence for a time. That lasted a decade before the deficits began again. When Justin Trudeau became prime minister he took the great, groaning weight of liabilities and doubled it in just six years.

According to the census data, the birthrate is the lowest it's been in a century. Every year the intake of immigrants grows as Ottawa strives to offset the shortfall, but even with an annual intake topping 400,000, it's not enough, Statistics Canada warns. Paying for the aged will thus fall on an ever-dwindling group: 20 per cent of those Canadians now working

THAT LASTED A DECADE BEFORE THE DEFICITS BEGAN AGAIN.

to pay the bills are nearing retirement themselves, and the number of people just entering the workforce is smaller than the share leaving it.

It would be nice to hope that the lessons of the pandemic had opened the eyes of those in power and created a single-minded focus on a health-care system teetering on disaster. But the evidence suggests otherwise.

Ontario's budget promised a steady stream of hospital projects over the next decade and a wad of cash to pay personal support workers, but the Conservative government that took office professing outrage at the size of the provincial debt has been adding to it ever since and offers little hope of a dramatic improvement in shortfalls to come.

As disconcerting as that may be, it pales in comparison to the federal government. Canada has a critical shortage of doctors and nurses, both suffering burnout after two years of COVID, continuing long waits for treatment and a system that is already richly financed but stumblingly inefficient. Yet rather than target improvement, the debt-strapped Liberals chose to splash out on costly drug and dental plans to satisfy a deal with the NDP, whose chief aim is to keep the Liberals in office.

Another tidbit from the census figures: the number of Canadian millennials is expected to finally pass the number of boomers by 2029. In many cities they already have. With luck, they'll leave their children a less self-serving legacy than we're leaving them.