Latest news with #SeniorCitizens
Hans India
4 days ago
- General
- Hans India
"Assistive Devices Worth ₹21.27 Lakhs Distributed to 93 Differently-Abled Persons in Gadwal".
Gadwal: District Collector B.M. Santhosh emphasized that differently-abled individuals should fully utilize the welfare schemes provided by the Central and State Governments. He stated that inclusive development and empowerment of every individual with disabilities is a key priority of the government. On Friday, a distribution event was held at the IDOC meeting hall under the aegis of the Department of Women, Child, Senior Citizens, and Differently-Abled Welfare, in collaboration with the Central Government. As part of the initiative, 114 high-tech assistive devices worth ₹21.27 lakhs were distributed to 93 eligible beneficiaries from the district through the Artificial Limbs Manufacturing Corporation of India (ALIMCO). The devices were handed over by Gadwal MLA Bandla Krishna Mohan Reddy and District Collector Santhosh. Speaking on the occasion, the Collector said that the government is always ready to listen to and address the issues faced by differently-abled citizens. He recalled that a special camp was held on September 28 in Gattu mandal, where eligible beneficiaries were identified, and the required assistive aids were prepared and now provided. The initiative was carried out with the support of ALIMCO, a Government of India enterprise. He also highlighted various ongoing welfare programs for persons with disabilities (PwDs), such as: ₹4,000 monthly pension 4% reservation in government jobs Financial subsidies UDID cards for nationwide access to facilities He urged all differently-abled individuals to avail themselves of these schemes confidently and move forward with self-reliance. The distributed equipment included: 28 standard tricycles 35 battery-operated tricycles 7 wheelchairs 8 walking sticks 4 crutches 16 BTE (Behind-The-Ear) digital hearing aids with zinc-air batteries 12 TLM kits 2 accessible canes (Sugamya Canes) 2 smartphones equipped with screen readers MLA Bandla Krishna Mohan Reddy, speaking at the event, reiterated the commitment of both the Central and State Governments to the welfare of the differently-abled. He acknowledged ALIMCO's role in supplying the much-needed equipment and assured continued efforts to provide more opportunities and support in the future. The program was attended by Additional Collectors Lakshmi Narayana and Narsinga Rao, District Welfare Officer Sunanda, ALIMCO representative Sunita Das, and several beneficiaries along with their families. This initiative reflects the government's inclusive approach toward social welfare and its commitment to ensuring dignity, accessibility, and equal opportunity for all.
Malay Mail
30-05-2025
- Business
- Malay Mail
Senior Citizens Bill crucial as Malaysia nears aged nation status, says Malaysian Bar
KUALA LUMPUR, May 30 — The Malaysian Bar has urged the government to urgently table the Senior Citizens Bill, stressing the need for a comprehensive legal framework to protect the country's growing elderly population. With Malaysia projected to become an aged nation by 2040 — when 14.5 per cent of the population will be aged 65 and above — the Bar said this demographic shift demands legal safeguards to ensure the welfare and dignity of senior citizens. 'We commend the government's reported progress on the Senior Citizens Bill and hope that our analysis will be considered in the final draft,' the Bar wrote in a statement today, referencing efforts by the Ministry of Women, Family and Community Development to finalise the legislation. The Bar highlighted that 58 per cent of 54-year-old Employees Provident Fund contributors have less than RM100,000 in savings, far short of the RM240,000 benchmark needed to sustain a RM1,000 monthly income for two decades after retirement. It also applauded the government's move to consider raising the retirement age to 65, which would allow willing and able seniors to continue contributing to the workforce. In its recommendations, the Bar called for codified legal rights for the elderly, mechanisms to address elder abuse, the creation of a national oversight body, expanded community-based care, and improved access to legal and financial aid. The Bar further emphasised the need for mandatory licensing and regulation of care homes, noting that only 393 of these facilities are registered, with over 700 believed to be operating without oversight. It also stressed the importance of addressing mental health and social inclusion, and advocated for the use of gerontechnology — such as telehealth services and wearable health devices — to improve elderly care. The Bar cited best practices in Canada and South Korea, where comprehensive legal frameworks have improved the wellbeing and dignity of senior citizens, and expressed readiness to contribute legal expertise to strengthen the proposed legislation.
Yahoo
29-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Post-WWII Germany's first Jewish cabinet member on past lessons, new risks
Berlin — When Karin Prien's mother brought her to Germany as a little girl in the late 1960s, she gave her one urgent warning: "Don't tell anyone you're Jewish." Nearly six decades later, Prien is now post World War II Germany's first Jewish federal cabinet member, having been selected as the Minister for Education, Family Affairs, Senior Citizens, Women and Youth. Prien told CBS News she intends to use her platform to confront the rise of antisemitism in Germany and further afield, and the fragility of democracy in a country still reckoning with its past. "Well, in a way, I'm proud," the minister told CBS News in a candid interview. "Proud to be a minister in the federal government, but also that I'm recognized as Jewish and that German society is now so far [advanced] as to accept that Jewish people have a right to be a self-conscious part of this society." Prien's political career, and her personal story, represent an arc of conflict, tension and reconciliation that echoes that of post-Holocaust Germany itself. "A question of responsibility" Born in the Netherlands to Holocaust survivors, Prien moved to Germany at the age of 4. Even as a child, she was heavily aware of the silence surrounding her family's identity. Her mother's warning that it was still too dangerous to talk about being Jewish — more than two decades after the war ended — shaped her early years. "There was always fear. My mother was afraid that there were too many Nazis still around," Prien said. "It wasn't taken for granted that you could talk about being Jewish. It was something you kept inside the home." But that silence eventually became intolerable. As a young teen, she said she began to understand that the democratic values she cherished — freedom, human dignity, anti-discrimination—- required defending. "I decided, 'I have to do something about it. Democracy is not something you can take for granted,'" she said. But Prien still waited decades before publicly acknowledging her Jewish identity. The turning point came in the early 2010s, when she was already a member of state parliament in Hamburg. Prien began pushing for systematic documentation of antisemitic incidents in schools. When a journalist asked why the issue mattered so much to her, she paused and then told him: "Because I'm Jewish." "That was the moment I realized I had a political voice," she recalled. "I had some kind of influence. And for me, it was a question of responsibility." Lessons from the past for the threats of today That sense of responsibility weighs heavily on Prien in today's Germany, where she said antisemitism is no longer confined to the political fringes. "We see rising antisemitism all over the world," Prien said. "They dare to be openly antisemitic. I think it's now more than after the end of World War II. They dare to be openly antisemitic, and that's also in Germany getting stronger and stronger. That has changed. And so we have antisemitic tendencies on the margins, but we also have it in the middle of society." While Germany once appeared to be a model of historical reckoning, Prien said she fears complacency is setting in. After some "honest decades," during which Prien says Germans confronted themselves with the stark realities of their country's history, "now, people are dying. And now we have to find new ways to talk about that." Prien thinks that should include a shift in Holocaust education. She wants German schools to expand from their current focus on the atrocities of World War II to also teach the history of Israel, the cultural contributions of Jewish Germans, and the origins of antisemitism. "Jewish identity is part of German identity," she told CBS News. "Young people need to know that Jews are not only victims. Jewish people are diverse. They have a voice. They are part of this society." Prien said she draws inspiration from figures including Margot Friedländer, a Holocaust survivor who famously coined the phrase: "Be Human." That, Prien said, should be the foundation of any education system in a democracy: teaching empathy and human dignity. But it's not only historical facts and universal dignity that need defending, she said, it's also Germany's democratic fabric. "We are an immigration society," Prien said. "But we're not very good at having fair and equal chances for children who start with more difficult conditions." She sees educational equity and national democratic resilience as intrinsically linked. Prien is now leading efforts to limit mobile phone use in German elementary schools, warning that parents and policymakers have been too naive about the risks of digital exposure for young people. "We are anxious about the real world. We drive our kids to school and into the classrooms but we are not anxious about the stuff online," she said. "That has to change." Asked what message she has for young Jews with political ambitions in Germany today, Prien didn't hesitate: "Stay. Don't pack your luggage. This is a different Germany. This is a country where you can live safely. And it's our job to make that promise true every day." SpaceX loses contact with its Starship, spins out of control Post-WWII Germany's first Jewish cabinet member on finding her "political voice," facing the past Elon Musk says he and Trump administration sometimes have "differences of opinion"
Forbes
25-05-2025
- Business
- Forbes
If They're Telling You Why Treasury Yields Are Up, They Don't Know Why
PHILADELPHIA - FEBRUARY 11: Blank Social Security checks are run through a printer at the U.S. ... More Treasury printing facility February 11, 2005 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. As U.S. President George W. Bush travels the country to stump for his plan to change the Social Security system, opposition continues from some members of Congress and senior citizen groups concerned that the proposal would erode guarantees to the federal retirement program. (Photo by William) Everyone's got an answer for why Treasury yields have jumped recently. Yet no one knows why. Crucially, they don't know why precisely because they think they have an answer for the movements of the most information-pregnant income streams in the world. Please read on. Let's start with the obvious: all known information is already built into market prices. So when markets move in a seemingly sudden way, that's a signal of an unknown rather than known having revealed itself. Which means it logically wasn't the Moody's downgrade. Not only have past downgrades predicted exactly nothing about the future direction of Treasury yields, it's most useful to point out that ratings agencies are merely reacting to what's already known. And what's known is already priced. That's why the level of the national debt, $36 trillion and counting, similarly wouldn't be a mover of Treasury yields in either direction. Think about it. Particularly with debt at $36 trillion, and much more than that according to the crisis-driven scolds who point out the future liabilities that aren't funded, why would $1 trillion more, less, or in between mean anything? Sorry, but something so routinely commented on by politicians, economists and pundits couldn't possibly be a sudden source of new information. More realistically, total federal debt is the most priced information in the world. The Trump tax cuts? Oh please. Try to be serious. The same tax cuts that have been commented on by those same politicians, economists and pundits day after day for months would hardly move Treasuries based on House passage. The tax cuts were a known. A major known. Everyone with a pulse knew there would be something, and the something was hardly unlike the something that had been in the news since Trump's re-election in November. Ok, but Treasury yields are still up relative to where they were a few weeks ago, so it must be one of the above pushing them up, right? Not necessarily. As of Friday, the yield on the 10-Year Treasury note was around 4.5090, and two weeks ago it was around 4.38. This has to be Moody's, the national debt (!), the Trump tax cuts, or the so-called 'bond market vigilantes' imposing discipline on the markets! Stop, please stop! Has there ever been a more ridiculous notion than 'bond market vigilante'? The latter implies that occasionally a few or many desperados enter the Treasury markets, selling everything in sight with an eye on bringing discipline or whatever to Washington. It's all so mindless. The vigilante narrative imagines markets populated by sellers only, except that a seller requires a buyer to transact on his, her or – gasp – some computer's pessimism about the quality of future government income streams. But that's a digression. What about the jump in yields from 4.38 in May 11 to 4.5090 on May 23rd? Well, what about it? On January 12, 2025 the yield on the 10-year was 4.7740. Yes, the 10-year was even cheaper in mid-January before Moody's, before passage of the Trump tax cuts, and before the national debt crossed into the $36 trillion territory. Despite all this, an endless string of pundits has seen fit to explain the recent jump in Treasury yields; Treasuries the most owned assets in the world and once again the most information-pregnant assets in the world. Oh, the conceit! Oh, the empty, information-bereft commentary. If they're telling you why Treasury yields are up, they most certainly don't know why.
Local Germany
23-05-2025
- Politics
- Local Germany
What parents in Germany need to know about the planned schools shake up
For years a lack of investment and ambition has hampered attempts to improve education in Germany. Enter Karin Prien (CDU), Germany's new and super-charged Minister of Education -- officially Minister of Education, Family Affairs, Senior Citizens, Women and Young People, or head of the BMBFSFJ -- with ambitious plans to reform schooling in Germany. Prien, who has years of experience in the field as a state education minister for Schlewig-Holstein, is determined to take advantage of the ministry's expanded remit to 'think about education holistically … and from the perspective of children and young people.' So what does this mean in practice? Here are the main planned changes that parents of school kids in Germany can expect. The expansion of all-day schooling With German schoolchildren falling behind their peers in other countries, according to PISA scores , and more and more families with both parents in full-time employment, the minister is determined to push ahead with plans to offer all-day schooling across the country. These plans were originally introduced by the previous traffic light government, and many schools have already started building out new canteens and other school buildings they need to offer all-day schooling. Unfortunately, as many of these projects have fallen behind schedule, the first bill Prien has brought before parliament (which was discussed on Thursday morning) will attempt to delay federal deadlines for all-day schooling by two years, to 2030. READ ALSO: How do pupils in Germany compare in international maths and science tests? More investment in early education, and mandatory testing In interviews, Prien has suggested that the number of children who start school with a poor command of German is responsible for the relative decline in educational achievement in Germany in recent years. With the goal of raising standards, and halving Germany's school dropout rate by 2035, Prien wants to introduce mandatory testing for children at the age of four. She has also talked about introducing mandatory support for children whom the tests identify as being behind in their development. During a recent speech, Prien stated that the federal government would 'invest billions in daycare centres and schools.' The minister has also announced her intention to relaunch the language daycares ( Sprach-kitas ), and extend the Starting Chance ( Startchancen ) programme in schools to Ki tas in socially deprived areas. Prien also wants to review nationwide quality standards for Kitas , with a view to placing more emphasis on education and less on childcare. Advertisement No more mobile phones in primary schools? Prien has taken issue with children spending too much time in front of screens. School children in Germany are among the world leaders in screentime, according to a recent OECD report which found that 15 year olds in Germany and Austria use electronic devices for an average of 30 hours per week. Prien has set her sights on minimising screentime from an earlier age. She has spoken out against the amount of time pre-schoolers spend in front of screens, and voiced favour for banning the use of mobile phones in primary schools altogether. State ministers of education are already looking at the issue. Prien intends to help them in their deliberations by providing better access to scientific studies, evidence, and analysis. READ ALSO: What are the rules in Germany on students having phones at school? Advertisement Integrating youth services and specialised teacher training However, halving the school dropout rate in the next ten years won't be possible simply through testing pre-schoolers, offering all-day schooling, and banning mobile phones. Prien also wants to invest in more support for children who arrive late in Germany's school system – and in additional training for teachers on how to cope with 'difficult and demanding groups of pupils.' She intends to take advantage of the expanded remit of her ministry to 'link youth welfare services more closely with schools,' in order to prevent pupils from falling through the cracks. READ ALSO: What having kids at a German kindergarten teaches you about the local culture
