As of the end of 2015, the population of Chinese people aged 60 or older numbered about 222 million, about 16 percent of the national population, according to the Gazette of Social Service Development released by the Ministry of Civil Affairs of China on July 11.

Released by the National Health and Family Planning Commission, the China Family Development Report 2015 also indicates that elderly people living apart from their children account for about half of the senior population, while 10 percent of them live in complete isolation.

Chinese communities are illequipped to provide basic facilities and services for seniors living alone. At the same time, the development of basic infrastructure for the integration of medical and senior care also lags behind, said Wang Guangzhou, a research fellow from the Institute of Population and Labor Economics at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.

Mu Guangzong, a professor from the Institute of Population Research at Peking University, said some seniors suffer common psychological problems resulting from the “empty nest syndrome” include fear, helplessness, loneliness and pain. When the senses of seniors start to weaken, great stress and confusion can undermines the basis of a healthy productive life for seniors, Mu said.

It is necessary and urgent to advance the social mechanism to provide social support for empty nest seniors and seniors in isolation, said Ren Yuan, deputy director of the Institute of Population Research at Fudan University. Developing nursing homes and other senior care facilities is a necessary public policy choice, Ren said.

The ideal pattern of long-term care for empty nest seniors is elderly couples caring for each other, Wang said, elaborating that in cases where one spouse is incapable of caring for the other, the burden should fall on their children. In this way the burden of caring for empty nest seniors can be distributed based on kinship with a senior, Wang said.