Over 1.5m elderly have to reduce or stop social care as cost of living crisis soars

As one in 10 older people in the UK are reducing or stopping their social care or expect to do so in the coming months, Age UK warns it will be “inevitable” some “older people will suffer” piling extra pressure on the NHS.

A new poll published by Age UK found nearly nine million people who are over 60 said they believed that cost of living increases would affect their health and care needs over the winter and 2.5 million older people are already skipping meals or expect to do so over the same time period.

The poll also shows 22 per cent (3.6 million) of older people are already reducing or stopping spending on medications or specialist foods or expect to do so in the coming months.

One patient told the charity: “Sometimes I don’t take my painkillers or eye drops because they are too expensive. I cannot afford them.”

’Care workers are the only visitors many older people receive’

Age UK says it is “alarming” over a million and a half of older people are already cutting back or stopping their social care across the UK because they can’t afford the cost. This is “potentially disastrous” for an older person with care needs as “cutting back or stopping care in this situation threatens to pile” extra pressure on the NHS and hospitals as it greatly increases the chances of serious ill health and injury.

Caroline Abrahams, charity director at Age UK said: “Without the care they require, frail and unwell older people are more likely to fall, become malnourished and dehydrated, fail to take their medication and become seriously ill because an emerging health problem will not be noticed early enough.

For more on this tory visit the homecare.co.uk website