- Author
- U.S. Fire Administration | National Fire Data Center
- Title
- Fire and the Older Adult.
- Coporate
- U.S. Fire Administration, Washington, DC
- Report
- FA-300, January 2006, 60 p.
- Keywords
- adults | elderly persons | fire data | methodology | fire risks | health care facilities | medical services | fire fatalities | residential buildings | building fires | education | fire prevention | fire safety
- Identifiers
- trends and characteristics; fire risk factors to older adults; long-term care facilities; home health and hospice care; risk of fire fatality; residential fires and older adults; fire education and prevention
- Abstract
- Fire is a frightening possibility for older adults (65+) and a reality for far too many. Older adults confront distinct fire risk factors every day - many of which do not affect the young. This report delineates those risk factors and presents the statistics regarding the fire problem among the elderly in the United States. In 2000, individuals 65 years and older comprised 12 percent of the America's population. By 2020, the U.S. Census Bureau projects that the proportion of older Americans will rise to 16 percent (55 million older adults) and that by 2050 there will be more than 86 million older Americans, accounting for 21 percent of the U.S. population. More than half of older Americans are between ages 65 and 74; 88 percent are between 65 and 84. Fifty-nine percent of the elderly population are women and 83 percent are white. Seventy?three percent of elderly men are married compared with 41 percent of elderly women. Geographically, the largest population groups of older Americans reside in California, Florida, New York, Texas, and Pennsylvania. The South and Midwest have the largest number of elderly residents as a percentage of the overall population. Older adults are more likely than their younger counterparts to suffer from reduced sensory abilities such as smell, touch, vision, and hearing, and from diminished mental faculties such as dementia, Alzheimer's disease, and depression. Such impairments tend to reduce older adults' reaction times and place them at a higher risk for causing fires, and thus at a higher risk of fire death and fire injury. Disabilities present additional fire risks and concerns for the elderly. Twenty percent of Medicare enrollees aged 65 and older are unable to complete at least some of the normal activities of daily living (ADL) necessary for a degree of self?sufficiency, including bathing, dressing, getting in and out of bed, getting around inside, toileting, and eating.