00:04Volunteers pack frozen Lunar New Year dishes into boxes.
00:08These helpers from the Foundation for Childless Aging People
00:11have taken care of elderly residents in the Lingkou District of New Taipei for over five years.
00:17On this morning, they were on a mission to send this food to 30 seniors
00:21who live alone in Taishan District across the mountains.
00:31Mr. Chen lives the closest.
00:33Now age 70, he moved to the Taipei area from rural Taidong in his 20s to look for better work.
00:40In the last few years, he will collect and sell recyclables for some cash,
00:45usually making no more than 65 U.S. dollars a month.
00:49That's until his heart problems affected his work,
00:52causing him to rely on government allowances that are barely enough for him to make ends meet.
01:17With no income and in poor health, Chen says he's just living day to day.
01:22Over his three decades living here,
01:24his monthly rent has gone up by almost 100 U.S. dollars,
01:28and he couldn't negotiate a lower rate.
01:53Mr. Chen is not the only senior struggling to make ends meet and keep a roof over his head.
02:00How can you go to your house?
02:01Yes, it is.
02:02Yes, it is.
02:04Surrounded by plots of empty land and amid narrow alleyways lives Mr. Wong.
02:13At the age of 82,
02:15Wong can climb the stairs without breaking a sweat.
02:17But his asthma and years of smoking sometimes make it hard for him to breathe.
02:43Wang has been through two divorces and has two adult sons.
02:47Neither of them has offered him support.
02:50For 30 years, he's been on his own.
02:53He moved into this shared apartment after other landlords rejected him for his old age
02:57and lack of stable income.
03:00He said the rental conditions here are not ideal, but he had no other choice.
03:05I was born in a year and now I really need to find a house.
03:09I'm very difficult to租 a house.
03:13Many people are talking about this.
03:26People living alone like Chen and Wang make up over a quarter of Taiwan's elderly population.
03:32That's over a million people, many of whom need assistance.
03:37But only 63,000 seniors are on the government care list.
03:42And only 19,000 of them have medium or low income status, which grants them extra benefits.
03:47The Foundation for Childless Aging People hopes most of them can eventually move into social
03:52housing, where there is substantial care in a community for them to be part of.
03:57But not everyone can secure a room.
04:00Some of them even refuse to leave their current homes.
04:25The New Taipei City Government has been offering various services and working with civic groups to find more people who
04:32have slid through the city.
04:32social safety net.
04:34But until there's enough social housing units available or more support for elderly renters,
04:39any care services may seem like a band-aid, not a cure.
04:43Alex Chen and Irene Lin for Taiwan Plus.
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