|
One day Ulof Palma, Prime Minister of Sweden
and one of the most popular public figures in Western Europe, said that
the society's level of development must be estimated not by successes in
the economic and in the military fields, but by how well it maintains its
old people, children and invalids. The more humane society is, the better
care it takes of its weakest members. Applying this criterion, we can hardly
refer our society to the category of humane ones, for the old people here
have been just thrown to the side of life and forgotten. The old age is
always a hard trial, but an old age, multiplied by poverty, loneliness,
disability and illness - what can be more frightening than such an outcome
of the human life?
Transition to a market economy has proved to be particularly difficult
for the elder generation. As a result of the massive dismissals, many people
of a mature age (and first of all, women with two or three years until
the pension age), have lost their links with their work collectives, which
have been for them the only social relationships. The status of a pensioner
has pushed them down into the social abyss. And not only because they have
been allocated but a beggarly pension - the wages at many state-run eneterprises
are no more than an average pension, too, but also because their capabilities
and their desire to do something for society have proved useless and unclaimed.
We would like to tell you about the women, who, when faced with a similar
life situation, have not withdrawn into themselves and have not grown hard
at the heart, but have found in themselves the strength to assist still
weaker and needier people.
|
On the photo: Visiting nurse with her patient.
|
