Reverend Dick speaking at the thanksgiving service for Violet Moss Brown of Duanvale, Trelawny, on Saturday (Photo: Philp Lemonte)

DUANVALE, Trelawny — Clergyman Devon Dick is appealing to health and life insurance companies to provide long-term health coverage for the elderly.

“We must commit ourselves as a nation. Private sector — the providers of health insurance and life insurance policy — need to design specific programmes to help with long-term health care,” the clergyman stated.

“We are talking about 60 per cent of persons over the age of 65 that will require long-term health care.”

He defined long-term health care as a range of medical and social services that support the needs of people whose ability to perform everyday activities such as dressing, eating, bathing and using the toilet, has been diminished.

“The need for long-term health care could be the result of chronic illness, mental or physical disability, the ageing process, or serious injury from which the person is not expected to recover,” he said.

Dick, who is president of the Jamaica Baptist Union, was speaking on Saturday at the thanksgiving service for Violet Moss Brown of Duanvale, Trelawny, who died on September 15 at the age of 117.

http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/news/provide-health-life-insurance-for-the-elderly-8212-clergyman_113358