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Home care admissions surge 267% in a decade, prompting calls for aged care reform
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Home care admissions surge 267% in a decade, prompting calls for aged care reform
The Retirement Living Council (RLC) is urging the Australian Government to prioritise aged care reforms following the release of new data showing a significant increase in home care admissions over the past decade.
Home care admissions surge 267% in a decade, prompting calls for aged care reform
The Retirement Living Council (RLC) is urging the Australian Government to prioritise aged care reforms following the release of new data showing a significant increase in home care admissions over the past decade.
Statistics from the National Aged Care Data Clearinghouse 2022-23 reveal that admissions to home care have risen by 267% over the last ten years.
RLC Executive Director Daniel Gannon said the figures, combined with Australia's ageing population, should be a wake-up call for the government.
"In every Australian city, governments are grappling with ambulance ramping, a shortage of hospital beds, an aged care sector bursting at the seams, historic low rental and retirement village vacancies, and unaffordable, red-hot housing markets," Mr Gannon said.
The data shows that in the past 12 months:
- 38,302 people in NSW accessed home care (32% of national total)
- 30,842 Queenslanders (26%) accessed home care services
- 25,199 Victorians (21%) accessed home care services
Mr Gannon criticised the government's response to the growing care crisis, stating that this year's federal budget failed to provide a long-term plan for Australia's care challenges.
"While $531 million was allocated to clearing the home care backlog and $1.4 billion to aged care digital infrastructure, these are short-term responses to a problem that is decades in the making," he said.
The RLC is advocating for a policy approach that includes privately funded retirement villages to help provide more efficient care services.
"Retirement villages provide scale for delivering these services efficiently by reducing travel costs incurred by service providers, increasing the frequency of service delivery, and enhancing the quality and type of services," Mr Gannon said.
The report also revealed that in 2022-23, the largest share of home care admissions were at Level 2 (43%), followed by Level 3 (35%) and Level 4 (16%).
With more than 68,000 older Australians currently waiting for home care assistance, the RLC is calling for urgent action to address the growing demand for aged care services.
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