Elisabeth Rosenthal writes for Kaiser Health News on how postal workers could help care for older Americans. They have the time and they reach millions of homes a day.
Postal workers have less mail to deliver nowadays since so much correspondence is electronic. They could raise additional revenue for the USPS if they were paid to spend time doing home visits and basic health checks of isolated older adults. It sounds like a crazy idea. What skills do they have for this work?
Believe it or not, other countries are using postal workers to perform this work. These countries understand the dangers of social isolation. In response, they have successfully enlisted postal workers to check on vulnerable citizens. France and Japan both do so. It’s one way to address the shortage of home care workers and would help the US Postal Service earn needed revenue.
Today, literally tens of millions of elderly Americans are aging in place. They are living at home, but need help in order to remain in their communities. But, there is not enough help to go around.
Many older Americans with mental and physical conditions are forced to fend for themselves, even though they do not have the means to do so properly. For sure, they are not taking their medicines as they should and likely not eating properly either.
Rosenthal argues that the US Postal Service could make time for home visits by ending daily mail service and, instead, delivering mail three times a week. They would then have three off days to take on some of the home care services people need. They do not need a health care certificate to take a few minutes to speak to homebound elderly and make sure they have the food and prescription drugs they need. If trained, they could check blood pressure and blood sugar levels for diabetics.
The US Postal Service is losing money and at risk. Rosenthal argues that we should not lose our postal service because people are not mailing as many letters as they used to. We should make use of the postal workers in ways that help them and isolated adults living at home. There is a critical need.
To be sure, postal workers cannot cover the $160 billion US Postal Service budget gap through home visits to isolated older adults. But, Congress could take this first step of relieving postal workers of the requirement of delivering mail six days a week and allowing them to offer “nonpostal” services.
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