Pioneering Program Serves Rapidly Aging Immigrant Population
The San Francisco Bay Area faces a shortage of culturally competent residential elder care facilities due to high costs and a lack of bilingual workers. Amid these challenges, On Lok is a unique model of home-based care that supports older adults so they can age in place.
This kind of home care will be critical as the area’s 85-and-over population is projected to more than double from 2020 by 2040, according to state projections analyzed in a January report by the Public Policy Institute of California.
Elderly Latinos and Asians will see the highest population growth, driven in part by the significant migration waves from Latin America and Asia in the 1980s. By 2040, 88 percent of Asians in the state age 65 and over will be foreign-born, and about 81 percent won’t speak English at home, the report estimates.