Plan to reduce wait for care homes: send Hong Kong's elderly to Guangdong
With thousands dying on waiting list, minister says charity-run facilities may offer answer
Elderly people waiting years for a government-subsidised place in the city's care homes may be given the choice of joining a fast-track queue for places in two Guangdong facilities run by Hong Kong charities, said the labour and welfare chief.
With waiting lists for government-subsidised homes in the city running at more than three years - more than 5,000 died before getting a place in 2011 - Cheung called the move "a breakthrough".
"It is not to export our elderly to Guangdong, but more like to facilitate," he said in an interview with the South China Morning Post. "If cash is portable, then home care services can be as well.
"It could be done by buying spaces [in the two homes], or it could be in the form of a portable subsidy. But the whole plan is still being formed at the moment. These two care homes may not even know yet."
The queue constantly hovers at around 28,500 people and an earlier Post report stated it would take about 50 years just to clear the current list.
The two Guangdong homes in the frame were built with funds from the Hong Kong Jockey Club Charities Trust.