Fears over affording care overwhelmingly top list of health-related concerns for older Americans
For aging Americans who are 50 and older, the number one concern related to their health is affording care—not only for themselves but also for their friends and fellow citizens.
The National Poll on Healthy Aging from the University of Michigan conducted a randomly selected, stratified phone survey of individuals aged 50 to 101 and found financial concerns dominated the results, outweighing issues such as vaccine hesitancy, misinformation, alcohol abuse, drug abuse, pollution, loneliness, poverty and neighborhood safety.
Further, these results were consistent across all demographics, including specific age, location, political ideology, race, sex, level of education and income.
In total, 56% of respondents said they were “very concerned” about the cost of medical care, with the same number saying they were equally concerned with the cost of homecare or assisted living. Most respondents (54%) also said they were very concerned about the cost of prescription drugs.
Rounding out the top five were concerns over financial scams and fraud (53%) and the cost of health insurance (52%). In sixth was the cost of dental care, with 45% of respondents saying they were very concerned about aging adults being able to afford those services, especially if they make less than $60,000 annually.
“These poll findings make very clear that the costs of healthcare and risk of financial scams and fraud weigh heavily on the minds of adults age 50 and older. Among the 26 topics that respondents were asked about, those topics comprised the top six concerns across a wide range of demographic groups,” the authors of the survey report wrote.
Zooming in on race and gender
Concerns about some issues varied across ethnic groups. Discrimination based on race was listed as very concerning by 50% of Black and 26% of Hispanic respondents, as compared to 15% of whites.
Women were significantly more concerned than men about healthcare related scams (59% vs. 47%), and they expressed more concern about social issues such as loneliness (34% vs. 22%) and poverty in their communities (39% vs. 25%).
The total number of adults 50 and older surveyed was not revealed. The full report can be found here.
Chad is an award-winning writer and editor with over 15 years of experience working in media. He has a decade-long professional background in healthcare, working as a writer and in public relations.