Introduction
Social care is often integrated with healthcare as it needs constant interaction with the healthcare industry. Social care facilities are safe havens for exploited, despairing, and hurting individuals. It is a place for many elderly people in the evening of their lives. In many cases, such facilities are the only hope of survival for many humans. Those who require the facilities are distributed across all ages. Such neglected individuals can be found from birth to death. These social care facilities are run by governments, NGOs, philanthropists, companies, religious bodies, and individuals. These provide aid for those in need of care through government funds, donations, fundraising campaigns, and personal money.
However, the good intentions of these facilities have been put to the test in recent years. First came the pandemic, followed by job losses, business shutdowns, and difficulty in earning a living for a major portion of people. Social care facilities that depended on donations were directly hit because people were no longer able to donate money to these facilities. After the pandemic, the economic recession and inflation fuelled increased living costs. These had negative effects on the health and wellbeing of individuals dependent on social care facilities. Even today, the effects of these difficult times are being felt by social care facilities. In this article, we will discuss the newfound or magnified challenges faced by such facilities after the pandemic.
Refugee crisis
Source: Julie Richard Unsplash
The refugee crisis is a major challenge for governments. Refugee camps are considered humanitarian aid by NGOs and governments alike. Due to their nature and intent, refugee camps can be called temporary social care facilities. The 21st century has seen a major refugee crisis due to wars, civil wars, natural calamities, and forced displacements. According to UNHCR, currently, there are over 82.4 million people that are forced to flee from their homes. At least 26.5 million of them are refugees.
The recent Russia-Ukraine war resulted in thousands of Ukrainian citizens flocking to neighbouring countries like Poland. Governments opened up refugee camps to help the victims of the war. Through social care organisations and facilities, many have received aid in travelling, accommodation, and food. Some facilities even helped them with finding jobs and aiding in their healthcare issues. Children who lost their families, the elderly who need immediate medical attention, and physically and mentally challenged individuals because of the war need immediate help from social care facilities. This was also a major challenge for European countries. As wars and threats of imminent wars are felt around the world, social care facilities must be ready and resilient enough to face the problems caused by a heavy or sudden influx of refugees to their countries.
Old age home crises
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Many countries currently boast a younger population. When we consider some of these countries' birth rates, it is clear that in a few decades, these younger populations will become elderly without a sufficient younger population to replace and support them. According to a study, India's elderly population is expected to increase by 270% by 2050.
This is not only the case in India. China withdrew its one-child policy after it realised the dwindling population and its effects on the country's future. European nations have seen a steady decline in the number of natives. Currently, immigrants from other nations constitute a major portion of Europe's population.
Due to various social reforms and trends, nuclear families are settling for just one or two children. Many couples have even chosen not to have any children at all. Because contraception was widely available, the generation was able to significantly reduce birth rates. As a result, the need for old age homes will become an absolute and critical necessity in the future. Healthcare spending for the elderly will take up a large portion of the nation's GDP by 2050. Accommodating the large influx of elderly people will become a major challenge for social care managements around the world.
Foster care facilities crises
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According to UNICEF, there are around 153 million orphan children around the world. Also, there are over 168 million child labourers in the world. Child labourers account for 11% of children in the world, according to the ILO. Many of them are working in dangerous jobs like child soldiers or in manufacturing units of dangerous substances.
Many newborn babies are abandoned in trash cans or garbage dumping sites for lack of awareness of government initiatives. Recently, a dog protected one such child from other dogs for a night. The photo went viral and alerted officials, who rescued the abandoned baby (Source: Indian Express).
Such incidents occur due to societal evils like the greedy desire for a male heir or the fear of society in case of teen pregnancy. Caring for such newborn babies costs resources, time, and money for social care facilities. Orphanages running on low budgets find it hard to meet the demands of all children. Here, costs and adequate staffing to care for the children become a challenge for facility managers. In such cases, volunteering can help with the staffing problem. Online fundraisers can also help with adding extra money to the budget.
Adoption laws
The primary reason for the orphan child crisis in many countries is the complex legislation and paperwork required for adoption. In India, adopting a child legally is one of the most tiresome hurdles due to various laws and regulations. As a result, parents who want to adopt a child are blocked from millions of orphan children that need a family and love.
Lack of social care facilities
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According to the World Health Organization, over 1 billion people are living with some form of disability and the number is constantly increasing. Among these, a significant number of individuals suffer from genetic and mental health disorders. Such individuals need help in almost every aspect of their lives. Advanced care facilities designed with utter care are needed to accommodate and help such individuals live with dignity. Such care facilities need easy access to buildings and rooms; wheelchair access to upper floors; and preventive measures against locking oneself in a room. They also need safety structures against falling, cutting, or fire hazards. All such structures need careful planning and funding to materialise.
However, such facilities are insufficient to meet current demands. Not only these, but orphanages, cancer care centres, old age homes are all fewer in number according to the demand. With rising demands, adding more rooms with adequate facilities is a major concern for social care facilities that are operating currently.
Lack of social and health care workers
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There are approximately 59 million healthcare workers worldwide (Source: NCBI). And the World Health Organization predicts a shortfall of 18 million workers by 2030 in the healthcare industry. In India there are roughly 20 health workers per 10,000 population (Source: NCBI). However, this workforce is not equally distributed across all parts of the nation. Most healthcare workers prefer to work in lucrative areas where there are plenty of opportunities and room for career growth.
The number of healthcare workers and social care workers is even lower considering the low number of social care facilities across the world. The lack of social care workers is the result of many factors. Lower wages and challenging working conditions, stress in the workplace, and having to spend time with suffering individuals all day long can all be reasons for a diminished workforce statistics.
Lack of funding
The pandemic left the global economy in shambles. While developed countries are quickly coming back to pre-pandemic levels of economic activity, developing and poor countries are a different story. Its impact is a major blow for social care facilities that are dependent on government aid. Being a vulnerable industry, social care facilities need access to quality healthcare services, insurance policies, and operational costs to function properly. Fundraising campaigns are slowly becoming more fruitful both online and offline as businesses are becoming normal again.
Social media and the internet have become a major source of funding for many NGO-run facilities. There are even special fundraising websites like GoFundMe to further any cause. Many registered NGOs are registered under tax relaxation laws to stay relevant in the changing world. Indeed, FinTech start-ups like GPay and PhonePe have included donation buttons to major NGOs in India. Social care facilities that lack funds might turn to online solutions to raise money and create awareness.
Expensive healthcare services
Old age homes and foster care facilities need constant healthcare services for their residents. The elderly residents of old age homes need treatments for dementia, Alzheimer's, heart diseases, diabetes mellitus, and a whole range of other healthcare complexities. Foster care facilities need an incubator and immediate medical services for treating abandoned babies. They need a nutritionist's advice for children suffering from malnutrition. Social care facilities need walking aids, hearing aids, and surgical services for physically challenged individuals. They also need constant psychological treatment for mentally challenged individuals. Most of them need counsellors, coaches, and trainers. All these cost expensive hospital visits. In the absence of health insurance or government funds, these services are often denied to the social care facilities in many countries. In countries with poor healthcare facilities, it is even harder to obtain sufficient medical treatment. All these can challenge the scope of social care facilities.
Need for counselling
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Some social-care facilities work in the rehabilitation of exploited human beings, like sex workers, rape and incest survivors, acid attack survivors, ex-military personnel with PTSD, etc. All such individuals are in need of expert counselling to survive and not to succumb to despair or suicide.
According to a Fondation Scelles (via Le Figaro) report, there are 40-42 million sex workers in the world. Three in four of them are aged between 13 and 25, and over 80% are females (Source: Business Insider). All of them are the victims of social evils like poverty, human trafficking, and child marriage. These individuals are the victims of psychological conditions like learned helplessness. Finding them, rescuing them, and sending them to special social care facilities like rehabilitation centres is a major hurdle for police officers and activists.
However, without strong counselling, these individuals are at the risk of opening themselves up to the same exploitation after they come back to the outer world. Such facilities need to teach them skills, train them, encourage them and provide an opportunity to create a dignified life for themselves. For all of these, there needs to be a trained workforce that can manage these individuals. Without their efforts, all the previous risks taken by officials go down the drain. Finding such talents is a challenge for social care managers.
End of life care
Due to the onslaught of terminal and incurable illnesses like cancer and HIV/AIDS, many individuals are out of medical help. Such patients need critical care until their last breath. Cancer care facilities care for terminally ill patients throughout their lives. For such patients, providing medications to minimise pain, giving emotional motivation up to the last moment, and nourishing them both physically and emotionally takes a lot of work from cancer care facilities' staff. Adequately trained and empathetic staffs who are also experienced in handling such patients are short in supply. Finding social care workers for such facilities is a major hurdle for management and HR.
Conclusion
Social care facilities are creating a better society by helping humans in need. The budget, though, is a major concern for many. Even then, social care managers are making ends meet somehow. Governments, philanthropists, and generous companies are making such work easier by providing adequate financial support. However, this is not enough. The coming decades might see a major inflow of the elderly into old-age homes. Wars and natural calamities create more orphans, refugees, and physically and mentally challenged individuals. As healthcare progresses, the ageing population will dramatically increase. Hence, the need for more social care facilities is more critical than ever.
Along with that, governments and social care managers also need to find ways to reduce the complexities associated with adoption and make it an easy process. This can give relief to orphan children as well as families that want to adopt a child. Coming decades will see major government spending in health care and social care facilities. In all such facilities, emotionally, socially, and academically competent management professionals are needed to make the facility a success. Finding such managers is also a major challenge for facilities.
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