Expert alert: Mass immigration and falling birthrates are shrinking the population

2023-12-01 19:02:00, Aktualitet CNA

Expert alert: Mass immigration and falling birthrates are shrinking the

The social consequences of immigration, the appropriate policies in the education and health system were some of the topics that Ditmir Bushati discussed today in Public Square with his next guest, Arjan Gjonçaj, Professor at the London School of Economics (LSE) and expert in United Nations on population and education issues.

The interlocutors shared the opinion that the demographic changes are leading the society towards some challenges which will be felt very quickly, especially in the third age.

"Albanians are emigrating in large numbers. But, having a very massive emigration and falling birth rate, the population is shrinking by about 20 thousand people a year", said Gjonça.

Bushati and Gjonça shared the opinion that we are at an important moment in which the government must reflect immediately, making the necessary interventions, and at this point the three basic problems are "pension scheme, health and social care".

As for the pension scheme, Gjonça says that the western world has solved it with private pensions, but this requires a very large development of the economy and services. We are still very far in this direction, he continues, since "people do not have the income to pay private pensions. It is only a small elite and, secondly, the state currently does not have the financial means to increase pensions".

As a conclusion, we will create a very pronounced inequality between pensioners.

The health condition is again a problem related to this group. According to him, we have positive trends for cancer and cardiovascular diseases towards a decrease, but we have an increase in chronic diseases.

"These diseases are not easy to cure, these diseases especially require the tertiary sector. This means that the hospitals are extremely well equipped and in Albania we are still far from the necessary standards", he continues.

Thirdly, social care for the third age is very important. In Albania, we have two problems, you say, "first, we don't have children who took care of their parents because they fled to emigration, and second, we don't have institutions for social care".

In the same logic, Gjonça continues, and the fertility incentives undertaken by the Albanian government will not give the desired effect.

"If you are going to stick to financial incentives, the only thing that should be done is in the long term, and above all, this should be accompanied by supportive policies for the mother", he emphasizes.

The LSE professor says that "Health and education are issues of national importance and sites like this require bipartisan solutions." And at this point he says that a destructive problem for the health system in Albania remains the lack of regulation of relations between the private and public sectors./ CNA