BY NATASHA JEE & IVY MARIA CHRISTOPHER
KUCHING: The younger generation has been advised to adopt a healthy lifestyle to achieve longevity in all aspects.
Welfare, Community Wellbeing, Women, Family and Childhood Development Minister Datuk Seri Fatimah Abdullah said practising a healthy lifestyle since young allowed them to age well, be it physically, mentally and socially.
“We want our senior citizens to have longevity in all aspects, and to achieve this, it must start from young,” she said during her visit to the Senior Community Activities and Memory Care Innovative Hub at 352, May Ling Garden, Lorong Sungai Maong Tengah here, today.
She reminded the younger generation to eat well, live a balanced life and stay healthy.
“It is important to take care of your body while young, and not wait until you are old.”
The Senior Community Activities and Memory Care Innovative Hub was recently set up, and it aims to provide a platform for the senior citizens to have a healthy and better living via its various mental, physical and memory programmes.
It has yet to fully operate given the current Covid-19 situation which posed a risk to the elderly.
Fatimah congratulated Happy Longevity Welfare Society chairman Annie Chua for her passion, which took her more than 10 years of studying, planning and finally setting up the hub.
“We are entering an era where Malaysia will join countries like Japan, United States of America, Singapore as an aged nation by 2030, whereby 15 percent of the population will reach 60 years old.
“Indeed, it is timely to set up such hub in addition to the Senior Citizen Service Centre, Senior Citizen Activity Centre and other centres set up by non-governmental organisations for the elderly which are line with the ministry’s policies of preparing the society to be an aged country in nine more years.”
She lauded the hub’s programme, specially created for the elderly to keep their mind active and provide a digital platform for them to share their work or life experiences.
“It is quite interesting that not only do you focus on providing quality care but also focus on memory care to ensure it does not deteriorate too fast. Therefore, I believe this (hub) should be exemplary to the other senior citizen care centres so that the rate of memory loss can be slowed down.”
Fatimah added that the hub had registered with the Registrar of Societies, and encouraged them to register under the State Social Welfare Department.
“This is to ensure the premises comply with the safety and health requirement. Also, once registered with our welfare department, it will be easier to apply for a government grant.”
She also said that she was ever ready to accept Chua’s offer to be the patron of the hub once it is registered under the welfare department.
Meanwhile, Sarawak United People’s Party Batu Lintang branch chairman Sih Hua Tong said he had learned a lot from Chua on the elderly and the importance of memory care.
“It is her passion that ignited my spirit of wanting to support this memory care centre and make it a success.
“No doubt, it is a learning model, and I believe we are initiating a home-grown learning model with solutions that suits the local conditions and living lifestyle.”
Also present were Assistant Minister of Community Wellbeing Datuk Francis Harden Hollis and Sarawak Social Welfare Department director Noriah Ahmad.
