Across Australia, there were 2,717 homes providing residential care on 30 June 2019, according to the latest data from the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare.
Around two-thirds (61%) of these were run by Not For Profits, while For Profits made up 26% with the remaining 13% Government-run.
In total, there were over 220,000 residential care and flexible care places across the country.
This equates to 81 residents per provider. This doesn’t make sense, but it is true. Regional and remote NFPs account for a number of the smaller RACs but there is also a considerable number of stand-alone private operators.
The question is: do we need all of them? Can they be viable post-COVID?
Will they also survive declining occupancies, which pre-COVID was sitting at around 90% nationally? And this is an international trend. Markus Leser from CURAVIVA tells us Switzerland has dropped from 97% to 90% in 10 years. Steve Munroe, Editor of The SeniorCare Investor, tells us skilled nursing home occupancy is down to 84% in the US.
The data here notes that the national target provision ratio was 79.6 aged care places at 30 June 2019 – right on target for every 1,000 people aged 70 years.
So, there is not pent-up demand.
The Royal Commission into Aged Care is going to place big extra costs on all operators in IT, governance and overall clinical performance that is going to stretch resources and management skills.
