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[Translated] In Belgium, we are immensely lucky that our health care system is based on solidarity. It is important that this continues and is even strengthened to avoid inequalities.

[Translated] It would be good if the decisions were also upheld when the care allowance is raised. Often the decision ends up in court and it is possible to challenge it. It should not be made difficult for those who are dependent on this financial support.

[Translated] I am not happy with the current nursing home system and it is a system that is focused on services and not on people. It is desirable that this changes with everyone’s help.

Thanks for keeping this in the public eye. No easy answers, I’m not sure I agree with all of mine today, but we must keep trying!!

[Translated] Children and partners should never be forced to take care of their relatives. Everyone wants to be able to live their life the way they want. It’s great that a survey like this is being done. Thank you!

[translate] I hope your study can contribute to helping older people in need of care.

[Translated] Do not forget to correlate loss of functional independence with disease. Do not forget that 30% of dementias can be prevented and that frailty is preventable and reversible: prevention must also be funded.

[Translated – excerpt] Long-term care is an obligation of society. The administration has to participate and set criteria for equality, but it has to get involved in management, if it wants to do so under the same conditions as everyone else. Give a choice to the citizen who chooses what he/she wants, not what the administration thinks (free choice). Care should be directed by the people, not only centred on them. Empowerment of the citizen. Promote professional training and above all competences and skills. Increase staff ratios and salaries, and above all work/family/leisure balance. There is a lot of work to be done.

[translated -excerpt] I would like to see society organise a systemic way of funding care for older people in their own homes for as long as possible, and then in institutions when they need it. Funding should be provided through long-term contributions to an individual’s fund, as for a pension, or through insurance. The problem of paying for care for the elderly is a major problem, and the hardship and burden on the person being cared for and on those close to them is great.

[translated -excerpt, emphasis in original text] Home-based assistance offered by the Romanian state to older people DOES NOT EXIST. This is unacceptable. […] for sick people and the elderly the situation is extremely BAD. There is no help. No state funded services to help them at home or in an institution, facilities for the elderly are so bad they are more like prisons or labour camps. I also strongly advise you to do a study and personal visits to psychiatric hospitals, and how mental health is treated in Romania.