European Conference on Care and Protection of Senior Citizens: Indicators for Dignity at Old Age the

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European Conference on Care and Protection of
Senior Citizens Indicators for Dignity at Old
Age the Finnish example

• Viveca Arrhenius
• Ministerial Adviser
• Ministry of Social Affairs and Health
• FinlandPrague, 25th of May 2009

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National Indicators on Welfare, Health and Gender
in Finland

• the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health is
  currently monitoring and assessing the
  effectiveness of its policies and interventions
  through a package of 44 indicators
• the information is collected from different data
  sources (Statistics Finland, National Institute
  for Health and Welfare, MSAH, Finnish Centre for
  Pensions, Social Insurance Institution of
  Finland)

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National Indicators on Welfare, Health and Gender
in Finland

• The indicators are grouped along the following
  strands 1. Promotion of health and functional
  capacity (17 indicators)2. Increasing the
  attractiveness of working life (3 indicators)3.
  Reducing poverty and social exclusion (8
  indicators)4. Functioning sevices and reasonable
  income security (13 indicators)5. Gender
  equality (3 indicators)

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Indicators and targets for dignity of old age

• People aged 75-84 that can move outside alone
  without difficulties as a proportion of the age
  group
• People living at home as a propotion of the age
  group
• Pension-age expectancy for 50 year-olds- target
  for 2009 61,8 years for both women and men and
  preliminary for 2011 62,3 years

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Indicators and targets for dignity of old age

• Average number of years in working life
• Proportion of people in low-income households-
  target for 2009 11 and preliminary for 2011 10
• Realisation of care guarantee number of persons
  waiting over six months for specialised medical
  care- target for 2009 3000 persons

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National targets for services for older persons

• Services for older persons, proportion of
  clients 75 year or older1. Home help-target for
  2009 19,5 and for 2011 20 2. Service
  housing- target for 2009 6,5 and for 2011 6,5
  3. Old peopleshomes- target for 2009 3,8
  and for 2011 4,0

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National targets for services for older persons

• 4. Long-term care at health centres- target for
  2009 2,0 and for 2011 1,55. Informal care
  recipients- target for 2009 4,3 and for 2011
  5,0

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National framework for high-quality services for
older persons

• Designed to help municipalities and co-operation
  districts to develop their services for older
  persons
• The goal is to promote the quality and
  effectiveness of social and health services for
  older persons
• Guidelines for values and principles, promoting
  health and welfare, personnel and management and
  care environments
• Accessible in English at www.stm.fi/publications
  (2008)

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European challenges

• To collect reliable and comparable data and
  statistics at national level
• To adapt data collection into an European
  context avoiding duplication
• To design European indicators which treat
  different systems, contents of services and
  member states fair
• Consider linking the work on indicators for
  dignity of older persons to the work of the
  subgroup of the Social Protection Committee and
  other relevent processes

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The way forward

• Communication from the Commission (COM 2008) 418
  final on A renewed commitment to social Europe
  Reinforcing the Open Method of Coordination for
  Social Protection and Social Inclusion-
  boosting analytical capacity and data collection
  aimed at supporting national target setting-
  three strands poverty and social exclusion,
  pensions, healthcare and long-term care

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The way forward

• -14 indicators listed in annex 2 including
  healthy life expectancy and relative income of
  older persons
• The Indicators subgroup (ISG) work programme
  2009- amongst others work on indicators for
  active inclusion housing and homelessness,
  social aspects of migration, material
  deprivation, child wellbeing, health and work
  intensity