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"content": "that category, the county government and the national Government are obligated to have community based programmes for them. In some situations, it may very well be that the old person should be taken care of under that community based programme. However, there should be a programme to assist the family itself to take care of the older members of the society. I am sure that many of us know it is only a few members of the family who go out of their way to take care of the old people. They may not be able to do as envisaged in this Bill because they do not have the means. In many families where the father becomes very old and he cannot do anything, the daughters go out of their way to take turns to look after their parents. In many cases, the daughters or even their husbands may not be employed, but they feel such love for their parents that they say, “no, we shall do what we can.” This Bill should, therefore, also have a provision to take care of such family members. By family members, I mean the extended family members; and they may even include friends. Sometimes friends can be even more loving than relatives. If you have such people who can take in that old man to stay in their home – not to be in these programmes there with everybody else – just to love and take care of them, then that family should be assisted. There should be a programme to assist that family in one way or another. The programme may involve a doctor visiting the family from time to time. I know that in France, sometimes doctors visit homes. Somebody was telling me the other day that in Cuba, for example, there are community doctors who visit homes to make sure that the older members of the community in those homes are taken care of. If they are sick, they are treated and so on. Furthermore, I was told that when the older person dies, the doctor is stopped from working until it can be shown that the death was not as a result of negligence on the part of the doctor. The Bill is excellent, but I feel that there should be a few amendments here and there to take care of what I said; not community based, but just family-based care. It may very well be that the county government may have an office which looks after old people. That way, people with various specialties can be visiting the homes where these older members are being taken of just to ensure that they are being taken care of well. If a family, for example, does not have food to give the older person, that office will ensure that the food is provided to that family to take care of that old person in that home. That way, when the good Lord calls that person to go and join Him in Heaven, at least he will be dying in the company of the people who loved that person, and viceversa . This is better than dying in a home somewhere where all the people there are ideally strangers. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, that is the only contribution I wanted to make on this Bill. I am very happy, that Clause 28 deals with services rendered within a home for the old people. What I want is for those types of services to also be rendered to a family which has an older person residing with them, and not only in a home for older people. Although I have taken care of my children, I hope that when I get older, they will not say: “ huyu jamaa sasa amekuwa mzee; sasa aende kwa older people’s homes so that he can be taken care of there.” I would not want that. However, where it happens, I understand that the society has come to a level where it is a norm now. Whereas this Bill provides the best for everybody, they should The electronic version of the Senate Hansard Report is for information purposes only. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor, Senate."
}