President Yoon Visits Unregistered Senior Center in Gangbuk-gu, Seoul
Minister of Health and Welfare: "Will Complete System Improvement Within the Year"
President Yoon Suk-yeol stated on the 7th, two days before the Lunar New Year holiday, "Even if a senior center is unregistered, since it is a place where the elderly gather to eat together and engage in leisure activities, the government will prioritize supporting heating and rice costs this year to ensure no one feels excluded, and we will also prepare measures to improve the standards for senior centers."
On the morning of the same day, President Yoon visited an unregistered senior center in Gangbuk-gu, Seoul, to greet the elderly for the New Year and made these remarks. The presidential office explained that this visit was made ahead of the Lunar New Year holiday for the president to visit the field of public livelihood, listen to the voices of the elderly, and check the usage status of unregistered senior centers. President Yoon also delivered Lunar New Year gifts consisting of traditional liquors for ancestral rites, citron syrup, pine nuts, and beef jerky.
Although unregistered senior centers effectively perform the functions of senior centers, they do not meet some criteria such as facility requirements and user capacity, and therefore do not receive support for heating and cooling costs, rice costs, or operating expenses.
The senior center President Yoon visited that day is about 7.6 pyeong (25.12㎡) in size, lacks an internal restroom, and is unregistered because the number of elderly users falls short of the standard (20 people).
Minister of Health and Welfare Cho Kyu-hong, who accompanied President Yoon to the senior center, reported, "According to a full survey, there are about 1,600 unregistered senior centers nationwide, used by approximately 23,000 elderly people. We have taken measures to immediately conduct safety inspections and provide heating and rice cost support for unregistered senior centers. We will complete institutional improvements for unregistered senior centers within this year to eliminate welfare blind spots."
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