As the leader in the group long term care market, Unum provides an annual review of sales and claims trends each fall in recognition of Long Term Care Awareness Month in November.

“We carefully track these trends so we understand the needs of our customers,” said John Noble, director of long term care products for Unum. “More people expect to be able to receive care at home, and making that possible is an important element of long term care coverage.”

Of Unum’s inforce policies, 93.4 percent are purchased to cover some type of home care. And nearly 70 percent of Unum’s group customers use their long term care benefits for care that occurs in the home.

Unum holds 76 percent of the group long term care market and has ranked No. 1 in the industry in terms of inforce cases and insured individuals for the past three years. In 2007, Unum covered 653,038 people under its long term care policies.
Further analysis of the group long term care sales data reveals:

– Women represent the majority (52 percent) of the purchasing population.
– The average age of a purchaser of a group long term policy is 43.5.
– Unum experienced a 37-percent increase in new long term care cases sold in 2007 compared to 2005.
– The top five industries purchasing group long term care insurance are law firms, physicians, insurance brokerages, management consulting services and engineering firms.
– The top five states purchasing long term care insurance are California, Florida, Ohio, Texas and Georgia.

Unum revealed in last year’s Landscape of Long Term Care a dramatic increase in employer-funded policies. The trend continued into 2007, with 90 percent of new group long term care cases being employer-funded.

This year, Unum reveals insight into those businesses. More than 53 percent of employers offering long term care coverage have 250 employees or fewer. More than 36 percent of those employers have fewer than 100 employees.

“We continue to see the smaller to mid-level employers willing to offer long term care coverage to their employees and also fund some of the cost,” said Noble. Unless referenced otherwise, the statistics included in this news release are based on Unum internal data as of 2007.

Nursing home costs in Hawaii are 44 percent higher than the national average, according to a new report from MetLife.

A private room at a nursing home costs $306 a day in Hawaii, compared to the national average of $212 a day.

The 2008 MetLife Market Survey of Nursing Home and Assisted Living Costs found that the nationwide average rates for a private room in a nursing home remained almost unchanged from 2007.

Alaska had the highest daily average at $577. Meanwhile Louisiana had the lowest at $127 a day.

The monthly average rate for assisted-living communities in Hawaii is nearly 18 percent higher than the national average, according to the report.

Assisted-living communities in Hawaii cost on average $3,566 a month, compared to $3,031 nationwide. Southern Maine had the highest average monthly base rate at $4,708, meanwhile North Dakota had the lowest rate at $1,980.

The average daily cost of a private room in a nursing home in the United States stayed essentially the same as last year, according to the 2008 MetLife Market Survey of Nursing Home & Assisted Living Costs. The average rate for a private room is $77,380 a year, or $212 a day, an increase of one dollar from last year. Meanwhile, assisted living costs increased 2.1 percent from an average of $2,969 monthly or $35,628 annually in 2007, to $3,031 monthly or $36,372 annually in 2008.

The survey also reports on the cost of a semi-private room in a nursing home, which increased 1.1 percent to $191 a day, or $69,715 a year, a 3 percent increase over last year.

Once again, the highest rates for a private nursing home room in 2008 were found in Alaska, where the cost is $577 a day on average. The lowest rates were found in the non-metropolitan and non-suburban areas of Louisiana, at $127 a day. The cost of assisted living was the highest in southern Maine at $4,708 per month and the lowest in North Dakota at $1,980 per month.

New rules passed by Congress this summer and set to take effect Nov. 1 have beefed up the federally insured reverse-mortgage program, raising loan limits and lowering origination fees. Called Home Equity Conversion Mortgages (HECM), these loans let seniors age 62 or older tap into the value of their home to get tax-free cash.

To be sure, the timing of the rule changes comes amid a maelstrom in the overall mortgage and housing markets. But industry experts say that lenders are still providing HECMs, which are insured by the Federal Housing Administration (FHA).

In contrast, reverse mortgages built and backed by private lenders are in short supply. According to those who work in the reverse mortgage industry, HECMs account for more than 90 percent of the reverse-mortgage market and currently represent about 99 percent of reverse mortgages being made.

Until a recent slowdown in their growth, HECMs’ popularity had been soaring, especially during the mid-decade years. Yet, their market penetration remains only about 1 percent of those eligible to receive them.

Reverse mortgage loans are based on a person’s home as collateral, not on their income or creditworthiness. The loan can be obtained as a lump sum, line of credit, monthly payments, or a combination of these ways. The money is not repaid until after the homeowner dies or otherwise permanently leaves the house. After that, the borrower or his heirs repay the loan, plus compounded interest on it. But the size of the repayment cannot exceed the home’s value.

The actual size of a reverse-mortgage loan depends on the age of the borrower, the value of the home, closing costs, and current interest rates. Generally, the older the borrower, the more valuable the home, the lower the interest rate, the more money a reverse mortgage can provide.

Experts say the new rules more closely align HECMs with today’s home values while boosting safeguards for elder borrowers. Among the key provisions:

•Loan limits will be raised to $417,000 nationally, versus the prior limit, set on a county-by-county basis, ranging from $200,160 to $362,790.

•Origination fees will be capped at 2 percent on the first $200,000 and 1 percent on any amount above that, with a inflation-adjustable limit of $6,000. The prior cap was 2 percent of any loan amount.

•HECMs can be used to contribute to the purchase of a new residence – an option that may be popular with seniors who want to downsize their living space.

•HECMs can be obtained on co-operative properties. Previously, reverse mortgages were limited to single-family houses, townhouses, and condominiums.

•Beefed up consumer protections. Some seniors have complained about being urged to use their loan money to buy other financial products – annuities, life insurance, long-term care insurance – that were either inappropriate or they didn’t need. To address such abuses, reverse-mortgage lenders will be barred from selling other financial products to its customers.

Most aspects of the latter three changes will take affect in the coming months.

According to China’s official media, the senior population over 60 years old has reached 149 million. Many rest homes in large cities have few available beds. Population control programs have significantly reduced the number of children able to support older family members.

China News Web reported that the senior population over 60 years old in China accounts for 21.4 percent of the world’s senior population, ranking first in the world. At the beginning of the 1990s, 10 young people supported one elderly person in China. However, the ratio now is three-to-one. Because the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has imposed the one-child policy for decades, both elderly parents rely on one child. So the resources for senior care are diminishing in every family.
A survey showed that 20 percent of the elderly wish to live in rest homes. However, the current number of beds in rest homes can only provide for less than one percent of the total senior population.

In early 2006, there were more than 39,500 organizations and 1,497,000 beds for the elderly in China, which included social welfare homes, homes for the elderly, nursing homes, elderly apartments, and elderly care homes, including more than 29,680 rest homes and 895,000 beds in rural townships.
Shanghai is the first city in China to become an ‘aging’ city. It has nearly 3 million people over 60 years old, which is more than 20 percent of the city’s total population. This is nearly twice the national average. Many elderly people wish to enter their favorite rest homes, but actually, it is not easy.

It is reported that although the beds provided by Shanghai’s relevant organization had already been occupied long ago, there are still over 1,000 elderly people waiting for a room. Beijing has the same problem. It will require 20 years to solve the problem.

In addition, the aging population in Tianjin City has also been rapidly increasing in recent years. According to statistics, there are 1.56 million people over 60 years old in Tianjin, which accounts for 16.3 percent of city’s population, much higher than the national average of 11.6 percent. Among these elderly, nearly 160,000 need to live in rest homes, but there are less than 20,000 beds in the whole city. The supply is far less than the demand.
In China, the majority of elderly people live at home, especially in rural areas. Since the seniors have relatively less financial capability, the high cost of rest homes is a major restraint for living in a care facility.

A new study found that vitamin B supplements don’t slow cognitive decline in patients with mild to moderate Alzheimer’s disease.

The theory was that vitamin B might slow the progression of Alzheimer’s symptoms because the nutrient lowers homocysteine levels, which are elevated in people with the disease. Homocysteine is an amino acid produced by the body and has also been linked to an increased risk of heart disease.

“The results of the study indicate that we were successful in lowering homocysteine levels, but this did not translate into cognitive or clinical benefits,” said lead researcher Dr. Paul S. Aisen, a professor at the University of California, San Diego, Department of Neurosciences. “The disappointing conclusion is that high-dose B vitamin treatment is not helpful in Alzheimer’s disease.”

Aisen thinks this study clearly demonstrates that people should not be taking vitamin B thinking it will combat the disease.

“This treatment is not useful and should not be recommended,” Aisen said. “Because Alzheimer’s disease is one of the major health-care problems in this country and worldwide, and because our current treatments are not adequately effective, many people are seeking alternatives, and one alternative has been to use vitamin therapy.”

The findings were published in the Oct. 15 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association.

For the study, Aisen’s group randomly assigned 409 people with mild to moderate Alzheimer’s disease to high doses of folate, vitamin B6 and B12 or a placebo. The researchers then measured the rate of cognitive decline using the Alzheimer’s Disease Assessment Scale.

Over 18 months, they found that although vitamin B reduced homocysteine levels, there was no reduction in the rate of cognitive decline among patients taking the supplements. In fact, there was no significant difference in the scores on the Alzheimer’s Disease Assessment Scale among those taking supplements and those receiving a placebo.

Interestingly, the people taking high-dose vitamin B supplements had more symptoms of depression than those taking a placebo, the researchers noted.

Dr. Sam Gandy, chairman emeritus of the Alzheimer’s Association Medical and Scientific Advisory Council, said this study should put an end to the idea that lowering homocysteine levels helps Alzheimer’s patients.

“Since cerebrovascular disease pathogenesis and that of Alzheimer’s disease bear some relationship to each other, the hypothesis was put forward that if people were given B vitamin supplements to control their blood homocysteine, then this might lower the incidence of both stroke and Alzheimer’s disease,” he said. “Sadly, for the latter at least, the hypothesis has been rejected: Even among those with elevated homocysteine levels that were normalized with B vitamins, there was no obvious benefit in terms of lowering the risk for Alzheimer disease.”

Like similar studies with antioxidants, anti-inflammatory drugs and estrogen, this study suggests that treating the risk factors for Alzheimer’s after the patients have established disease is not useful and may even be harmful,” he said.

Pamela Mason, a spokeswoman for the Health Supplements Information Service, cautioned that vitamin B is a dietary supplement, not a drug, and shouldn’t be expected to perform like a drug.

“This is yet another study attempting to use high-dose vitamin supplements like drugs in the treatment and prevention of disease,” Mason said in a news release. “B vitamin supplements are not intended to be taken like drugs to prevent or treat Alzheimer’s disease. People should not be taking them for this purpose. They are health supplements, and their role is in helping to maintain good health, particularly in those large numbers of adults whose dietary intake is low. This study, like many other recent studies evaluating vitamins, does not address the issue of health maintenance.”

Monthly premiums for some of the most popular Medicare prescription drug plans in Florida are jumping by at least 20 percent for 2009.Seniors can now start comparing Medicare prescription drug plan choices for 2009 on the Medicare web site: www.medicare.gov. Seniors will be able to sign up for new drug plans starting Nov. 15. Open enrollment in the drug plans ends Dec. 31.

For 2009, Florida seniors will be able to choose from 57 prescription drug plans, compared to 58 plans this year. Monthly premiums for 2009 plans start at $16.70 compared to $12.10 this year. The most expensive premium for 2009 is $111.30 compared to $97.50 this year. Several plans have also increased their annual deductible for 2009.

The data on the Medicare Part-D prescription drug plans for 2009 has now been loaded into the computers and senior citizens can begin exploring their options for the new year. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services has been relentless in warning seniors that the cost of their current plan may increase significantly in 2009 and it is important they explore all the options, including other drug plans or Medicare Advantage plans with drug coverage.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) today announced that beneficiaries, their caregivers, and family members can begin to review 2009 Medicare prescription drug plan and health plan information online through the Medicare Prescription Drug Plan Finder and Medicare Options Compare at www.medicare.gov.

McCain’s top advisers this week said that as president, McCain would cut $1.3 trillion from Medicare and Medicaid. McCain adviser Douglas Holtz-Eakin told the Wall Street Journal, McCain would pay for the high costs of his health care proposal by taking a hatchet to health care coverage for the elderly, people with disabilities and lower-income families. A Center for American Progress study finds that McCain’s plan would force big cuts in benefits or eligibility for these vulnerable populations.

McCain’s call for radical cuts to Medicare and Medicaid will undermine their vital role in our health care system, putting affordable health care out of reach for millions of seniors, people with disabilities, and low-income families, and driving up the cost of health insurance for everyone else.

And why does the McCain campaign support undermining this pillar of retirement security? To pay for a “tax credit” in McCain’s health care plan that amounts to a subsidy for big insurance companies. (Maybe McCain thinks the $2 billion in tax cuts he would give the insurance companies isn’t enough.)

Sunrise Senior Living Inc. lost nearly a quarter of their value Monday and hit a seven-year low.The drop came against the backdrop of a steep market sell-off.

The company’s stock fell $2.55, or 19 percent, to $10.85. Earlier in the session, the stock sank to $9.51, a level not seen since April 2001. The shares have lost more than a third of their value in the past month and are down nearly 60 percent in 2008.

Analyst Derrick Dagnan of Avondale Partners said the company’s stock decline evidently exceeded that of other senior living companies because of ongoing concerns that it is not as sound as some of its peers.

“A lot of that has to do with the company’s emerging from a period where they just restated two years’ worth of accounting results and filed statements that had been past due,” Dognan said. “Management’s done a great job of getting this company back on track, but there are still a lot of questions.”

He cited issues involving its development project in Germany, significant writedowns and poor performances by its hospice and development businesses.

Sunrise on Sept. 10 reported a $31.8 million loss for the second quarter and said it had scaled back its planned openings of new centers to between 1,200 to 1,400 units from an earlier target of 3,200 to 3,400 units. It also wrote off $10.5 million of costs relating to discontinued development projects during the quarter.