The PT candidate, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, said today (22) that it is necessary to offer the care service to the elderly free of charge. “There is a profession that is emerging with force, which are caregivers. We are going to have to train a lot of people and we have to transform this into a public service”, he said when participating in a meeting to discuss policies for the elderly in the west side of the capital of São Paulo. 
According to Lula, it is still necessary to adapt the health services to assist the elderly in their specificities. “A person of a certain age who starts to feel pain in the leg, a pain in the spine [na coluna]as we say at the factory, there has to be a physiotherapist and this has to be free of charge for the companion who is retired”.
To finance these and other policies, the candidate defended changes in the tax structure and the strengthening of the Unified Health System (SUS). “And that’s why we talk so much about a new tax policy, about a tax reform. We talk about strengthening the SUS. Because if the person has to pay a caregiver, the person dies because they cannot pay, what they earn does not allow them to pay”, he highlighted.
Medicines should also, according to the candidate, be offered free of charge, especially for people with few financial conditions. “What we take continuously has to be given away for free to people. Because for a person who earns BRL 1,500, having to spend BRL 400 on medicine is over,” he said.
For Lula, elderly people need to be cared for in all areas, taking into account the contribution that this population has made to the construction of society. “It’s not old enough for us to make public policy for people. Everything we do for an elderly person is the consideration of service for what the person has already done for the country, for the city, for their family. And sometimes, we need to re-educate the family to [entender] that taking care of an elderly person is not a burden. We have to teach people to care,” she said.
