elder fiscal abuse Archives ⋆ Cathy Cress

The 2 Deadliest US Sites of COVID-19 Nursing Homes & Prisons

May 2, 2020

PRISON INMATES AND NURSING HOME PATIENTS NOT 6FT APART – 6 FEET UNDER

70% of inmates in federal prisons have COVID-19. In Kansas, the Lansing Correctional Facility had a riot of inmates over COVID-19 lack of care or protection It took the rebellion to get the coronavirus testing PPE and care. The Bureau of Prisons in Kansas confirmed finally that 79 staff have coronavirus and 88 prisons and prisoners dead.

Older residents in nursing homes cannot rebel like prisoners. Many can’t even walk. The Atlantic Magazine just published an article, We are Killing Elders Now. The writer states “In at least six states, these fatalities account for half of all COVID-19 deaths, and according to the World Health Organization, half of all coronavirus fatalities in Europe have been traced to nursing homes too. Some of this mortality is linked to long-term-care facilities that are shoddily run or that violate health standards. But most of them are doing the best they can with what they have. And they don’t have much”.

KAISER FOUNDATION NURSING HOME STAFFING AND USE OF PPE NOT REQUIRED IN MOST STATES

Kaiser reports -Staff Screening. It is more common for states to recommend rather than require daily screening of staff for illness in NFs (24 states recommend, 16 states + DC require)

Use of PPE. More states recommend (23 states) than require (7 states + DC) staff to use PPE

Two States that require testing for coronavirus of ALL residents of nursing homes are Maryland where 556 have died as of the Washington Post article. and Tennessee

THE FEDS HAVE NO CMS FEDERAL GUIDELINES OR REPORTING

We have no federal guidelines for safety testing according to an article by the Kaiser Foundation

It is now estimated that 16,000 deaths have occurred in nursing homes and that is without the federal government revealing any numbers and not making available any testing. But the numbers are probably huge- if we could just do testing.

CMS announced it would have a meeting of a “panel” of experts “ sometime at the end of May”. After probably 20,000 older people died and the feds did nothing this shows their sense of urgency about this pandemic’s national “elder cleansing”.

WHAT CONNECTS PRISONS AND NURSING HOMES – CONCENTRATION CAMPS

So, what is the connection between the viral spread of COVID-19 in nursing homes and prisons- 6 feet ? Prisoners and residents, in nursing homes, and prisons cannot social distance. Jails and prisons have human beings crammed together with no choice. Nursing homes have 2 beds or if you are on Medicaid three to a room. Neither group has a choice to social distance. They are ” concentrated” as in concentration camps or death camps.

Do SOMETHING – HELP NURSING HOMES PREVENT MORE CARNAGE

So, as someone who has spent her career in aging, I am calling out to everyone, especially professional in aging – do something. Since the feds appear to be doing little- call your congressman, write a letter to the editor.

BE KIND LIKE RACHEL MADDOW REPORTS LA JEWISH HOME LA WAS

Rachel Maddow suggests calling your local nursing homes and see what they need. Be kind like the LA Jewish Home was to a smaller nursing home LA Brier Oaks. They wanted to test their residents and had no tests and the larger LA Jewish Home had tests and shared them with the smaller as a good neighbor. What they found was ravaging but it also showed caring and generosity. Care and be generous and show the helpless elders in nursing homes in your town you are opposed to -nursing home being prisons or concentration camps.

Ten Warning Signs of Aging Dysfunctional Family- Warning Sign Number Two

October 30, 2019

Dysfunctional FamiliesAnger-physical anger, emotional abuse, financial abuse

Fiscal and emotional abuse is the red blinking second sign of the dysfunctional aging family. Anger occurs normally in all families. However, in dysfunctional families, anger may take the form of repeated physical or

emotional abuse. This happens not only in one generation but passed on to next and perhaps all subsequent generations. Adult children are often getting even with their aging parents for being neglectful, perhaps physically abusive parents when these angry adult children were kids.

Fiscal abuse is a ” sleeper” form of abuse, yet a pernicious aging family problem. Adult children committed a whopping 40% of the abuse. Other family members were the next big thief’s investigated. The coming holidays create jaw-clenching stress on adult children who visit and finally see their parents decline. This means they need to care for them, which they have no idea how to do. Part of that comes from- they were never cared for as kids themselves. The holidays can be saved for a dysfunctional family, by care managers. Care managers can help them avoid abuse and support them to get the care they need for their aging parents who neglected them as children.

Financial Advisors Can be Thieves Too

The so-called fiduciary rule, which was scheduled to go into effect in April, would have required financial advisers working with retirement accounts to put the interests of their clients ahead of their own—

Brokers are currently allowed to follow a less-stringent “suitability” standard, which lets them recommend options that cost seniors more—and pay them more—even if a cheaper or more appropriate choice is available.

The Trump administration “blocked this rule and continues to block many retiring and aging client interests – putting them second and financial advisors interest (or ) profit first. This rule was supposed to go into effect January first, 2018 but was blocked again until 2019″. Formerly representing the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Eugene Scalia played a major role in convincing an appeals court judicial panel to vacate the Obama Labor Department’s fiduciary rule. He is now Secretary of Labor and the DOL is working on a replacement rule to be unveiled by the end of the year.

Check out my latest webinar about working with dysfunctional aging families over the holidays

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Cat Burglar’s Stealing Retirement Funds Under the Trump Administration

January 8, 2018

I wrote a blog Saturday about families being the number one con artists in the game of elder fiscal abuse. Now I am going to bring in the big time thieves the- white-collar cat burglars of elder fiscal abuse

The rule’s dogged attack force has been led by Gary Cohn-president of Goldman Sachs before he became Mr. Trump’s top economic adviser. So, this is a pure Wall Street heist to hijack elders highly lucrative accounts.

In addition, the Wall St. Journal story reports that many of the comments made to the rule, are fake, bringing even more fears of government fraud and outside corrupt amputation to the democratic process that seems to slipping away

A care manager’s clients are most often affluent seniors in the top 10%, these clients will be affected by this delay in implementation, steering funding away from care into the coffers of Wall Street.

Did You Find Elder Fiscal Abuse Over the Holidays?

January 6, 2018

When you visited an elder family member over the holidays did you see something ” fishy” going on with their finances?? Was money missing from their accounts, expensive items purchased that the elder did not buy. Are they getting calls for donations from odd sources. All this can be elder fiscal abuse.This type of elder bank robbery represents a 36 billion heist and growing

Fiscal Elder abuse can be detected during the holiday season by visiting family / Paula Span, in her New Old Age column in the New York Times gave some very savvy tips that you should check out.

The worst perpetrators are not professional con artists. The most dangerous elder financial abusers aren’t folks running a scam like Bernie Madoff or crooks offering free lunches to retirees then swindling their money. Vicious financial abusers are most frequently the older person’s own family.

All we have to do is look at the infamous Brooke Astor case. Her son Anthony was convicted of siphoning millions and sentenced to one to three years in prison.
After the trial, one prosecutor called it “grand theft Astor,” with Mrs. Astor’s son on an “a six-year crime spree involving a series of larcenies”
A survey of State Adult Protective Abuse of Adults Over Sixty showed that the most common fiscal abuser was a son or daughter. Adult children perpetrated 33 % of the fiscal exploitation substantiated by APS. Other family members were the next biggest group of fiscal abusers investigated by APS. These other kin represented almost 22% of the financial abuser reported nationwide to adult protective services . So schooling midlife adult children visiting over the holidays to do some discreet detective work to check, desks bank account etc. What is important is they are not confrontive with the parent but to present questions as support for Mom and Dad
What are red flags for adult fiscal abuse
Financial abuse can have many faces
➢ Someone paying bills but bills are not paid
➢ Money missing from accounts
➢ Family member /caregiver withdrawing large amounts of money from accounts
➢ Someone taking money under false pretenses,
➢ forgery
➢ forced property transfers
➢ purchasing expensive items with the older person’s money without permission
➢ denying the older person access to his or her own funds or home.
➢ Scams perpetrated by salespeople
Elders rarely report elder abuse according to a Met life study on the crime. Only the tip of the iceberg of this con is reported for various reasons. Seniors often believe that they are responsible for allowing themselves to be swindled or abused. They frequently fear they will be placed in a nursing home if they report the crime. Older victims hold back in turning the perpetrator in because they are afraid the person will harm them further. And finally, since the tormentor is often a son or daughter their motherly urge is to protect the criminal in their nest.

If You saw fiscal abuse during the Holiday season visit to loved ones. report it to Adult Protective Services and call an aging life care manager . They are experts at helping you make sure this does not happen in the future with vulnerable elders.

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