As of March 31, 2022, there were approximately 705,000 seniors in Alberta.
The Office for Statistical Information estimates that by 2035 the number of seniors will exceed one million.
Today over 90 per cent of older Albertans live in private residences, and almost any study you might read about aging in place will indicate that over 90 per cent of Canadians want to stay and age in their own home and in their community.
The Government of Alberta announced $3.2 million in funding in June 2022 to Healthy Aging Alberta to enable community-based organizations across the province to offer older adults personal, psychosocial and mental health support.
Unison successfully secured funding from Healthy Aging Alberta to fund Veiner Vintage Transport in Medicine Hat.
If you look at our website you will see Veiner Vintage Transport Described in the following way:
Run by volunteers, Unison can take seniors where they need to go.
Veiner Vintage Transport remains committed to empowering older adults to maintain their independence and age in place by providing them with a reliable means of transportation.
By addressing transportation barriers and ensuring access to essential services, our program contributes to an overall improvement in the quality of life for seniors in rural Alberta.
You might ask what is so special about a transportation program for seniors?
Well, the program impacts the social determinants of Health positively.
The World Health Organization describes the social determinants of health as the non-medical factors that influence health outcomes.
Healthy seniors can live longer and live independently where they want to. Our program is aimed at getting seniors who have transportation barriers to health appointments and other essential services.
Also, it seems that anything these days that is really bad gets compared to smoking.
Recent research suggests that loneliness and isolation is as bad for you as smoking 15 cigarettes a day.
Veiner Vintage and our volunteers who support the program actively help seniors remain engaged in their community.
In many cases that may mean driving seniors to Veiner Centre to participate in programs or support groups.
This is a relatively new program for us, and we are ramping up our capacity. However, by May we were already up to 68 regular clients.
During that month our volunteers provided 90 rides, 20 of those were to the Veiner Centre, and the rest were to appointments around the community.
We have 15 volunteer drivers who do at least 20 rides a week.
We are pretty excited about the impact this is having in the community and we are proud to be partnering with Healthy Aging Alberta and the Province of Alberta on this initiative.
Oh and did I mention that if we have more volunteers and more donors we can support even more seniors in our community?
Call the Centre at 403- 525-8657 if you want to help us change lives.