With the average life-span for men and women increasing, many baby boomers will require long term care at some stage in their lives. This means that more seniors than ever before will have long term care needs, and more families will try as best they can to meet those needs. Currently, there are over 490,000 caregivers in the state of Louisiana. These families spend a grand total of 381 million hours giving care to a loved one in need each year. That number, while staggering, reflects only a portion of the sacrifices that family caregivers make each day.
Family caregivers are under tremendous strain.
And now is the time to create an infrastructure to assist them in their compassionate work. In March of this year, Senator Grassley and I, introduced legislation that would establish the National Family Caregiver Support Program. This crucial program would offer assistance to families through the Older Americans Act. Services, support and information would be available to millions of families right in their own communities. The OAA has not been reauthorized since 1992.