The Dominican population is relatively young, but is already experiencing a constant aging process Therefore, the number of people over 65 years of age has doubled in the last two decades, according to data from the United Nations Population Fund (Unfpa).
In the year 2000407,000 people were 65 years of age or older, which represented 4.8% of a population estimated at 10.8 million people; in 2020 this number doubled to 816,000 people in that age group, 7.5% of the population, and the forecast is that it will reach more than two million by 2050, that is 16%.
The median age also increasedgoing from 22.5 years in 2000 to 28 years in 2020 and is expected to be 37.5 years in 2050, warned the UN body on the occasion of World Population Day 2022, which is celebrated morning.
For the national representative of Unfpa, Sonia Vásquez, the Dominican state “has time to prepare” for the demographic challenge of having more elderly people and, therefore, with higher levels of dependency.
Part of this population reaches old age “without protection, because they could not integrate into the world of work properly”, becomes “dependent on their children or on the State and becomes a burden”, since they require a series of services of protection that are not available to everyone.
The theme of caring for the population dependent entails a derived problem, and that is that these tasks usually fall on women, who leave studies or work to take care of the elderly, children and the disabled.
EDUCATE THE YOUNG POPULATION
At the other extreme of the population problems in the Dominican Republic is the need to invest “quickly and urgently” in the education of the young population, “protection programs must be generated” to keep children and young people within the educational system, said the UNFPA representative.
The objective is to invest in the formation of human capital and in the establishment of social support structures to reduce inequalities and thus alleviate the high rates of teenage pregnancy and early unions.
The country has the highest adolescent fertility rate in the region, with 100.6 per 1,000; 19.1% of Dominican women between the ages of 15 and 19 say they have been pregnant; It also has one of the highest rates of child marriage, with 12% of marriages involving girls under the age of 15, according to data from UN agencies.
Along with academic training, it is important to implement a comprehensive sexual education plan that provides information and protection to adolescents, Vásquez pointed out, since only 32% of students in the country say they have received some type of guidance on sexual matters.
He also pointed to the need to make a “provision of contraceptives” for youth, who do not have access to methods to prevent pregnancy in 10.8% of cases, a figure that rises to 27% of adolescents, he explained.
Vásquez highlighted the actions that the Dominican State is already carrying out in this area, with an annual budget of 1.5 million dollars to distribute different contraceptive methods through a system that, in addition, takes into account the evolution of demand by geographical areas. .