Lynn Friss Feinberg, Deputy Director of the Family Caregiving Alliance's National Center on Caregiving

From my point of view family caregiving is a major public health issue. The emotional and physical effects of daily care of family, friends and neighbors are a major problem that must be addressed. In California, we have our caregiver resource center program which does assist families on a variety of areas related to well being, but one issue that we look at very closely is prevalence of depression. About 60 percent of families that come to the California caregiver resource center for help show symptoms of clinical depression, so this is a very serious pervasive problem - if family caregivers are unable to provide care to their loved ones, the public costs will become astronomical.

"Family caregiving is a major public health issue"

Another important issue is the lack of coverage of long-term care for both the care consumer and the caregiver. Families don't have to become impoverished… I think that families do a lot right now and are increasingly depressed, increasingly strained. From my point of view we need to have a social insurance model of comprehensive long-term care that really shares the burden with families and friends so that we don't have the situation of families burnt out or older spouses dying of a broken heart because of their caregiving responsibilities. I think we just need to be careful about asking families even more than they are doing right now.

Issues that Matter | Caregiving Professionals Forum