Too few beds to meet rapidly growing need

Nursing homes serving China's growing aging population have witnessed great opportunities for expansion, yet have a long way to go to come close to meeting the increasing demand.

One of the chief problems the country is currently trying to solve is a shortage of beds and services for elderly residents in need of care. By the end of 2013, around 42,500 organizations provided 4.93 million beds for 200 million such people, a person-to-bed ratio of 41-to-1.

Beijing has 416 nursing homes, according to the Ministry of Civil Affairs. The capital has more beds in each nursing home than anywhere else in the country, averaging 284 beds in each at the end of 2013, 2.7 times the national average of 102.

However, that is still far from enough to serve the rapidly growing aging population.

The gap between available beds and needy senior citizens in 2013 was more than 31,200, said Lu Jiehua, a professor of social sciences at Peking University.

His report on organizations for senior citizens, released in November, found that most of Beijing's nursing homes are scattered in the suburbs rather than downtown, and all the 11 districts and counties in Beijing need more beds to cater to demand.

Li Hongbing, deputy director of the Municipal Civil Affairs Bureau, promised the government would increase the efficiency of nursing homes in the suburbs and also build more nursing homes to cater to more senior citizens.

In addition to a shortage of nursing homes in Beijing, the services they provide are questionable, especially at private nursing homes.

A report in September from the China Research Center on Aging said low professional skills in services provided to the elderly is a major problem. In some nursing homes it surveyed, 74 percent of the nursing staff were migrant workers and former laborers, many of whom do not possess the necessary medical knowledge or skills.

Many companies providing nursing services have voiced their difficulties in doing so as they make very little profit, making it hard to afford professional staff.

The report said 28 percent of such homes in the country are privately run, but only 9 percent of those are turning a profit. Of the rest, 40 percent run at a loss, and the remainder barely remain afloat.

In Beijing, the installation of each bed attracts a government subsidy of 50,000 yuan ($8,050) at most and an ongoing contribution of 500 yuan a month after that, but many in the industry say this is simply not enough to make the business viable. Du Peng, a professor of gerontology at Renmin University of China, said that building senior care facilities requires large outlays, and the wait for returns can be long.

"Therefore, it is very difficult for private companies to build facilities and manage them properly. Moreover, because they are new and lack brand recognition, in such an immature market it is difficult for them to find widespread acceptance."