When you are old, who will look after you? Age becomes more of an acute problem should you become disabled and as society changes, your family might not be able to give you the care you need. These are also problems any government must deal with. For the first time on record, China has commissioned a survey on the disabled elderly in the country.

The report says up to 2010, there are 33 million disabled elderly in the country, accounting for 19 percent of the total aging population of China.

The disabled elderly is defined as individuals who require assistance with basic activities of daily living.

It is measured in functioning in six core activities of daily living, including bathing, dressing, using the toilet, transferring from bed to chair, moving indoors, and feeding oneself.

Wang Haitao, China Research Center on Aging, said, "The measuring is based on the elderly's ability to perform daily living activities. It's different from the medical term of disabled. Among the six core activities, if the elderly fail to perform three or above, they will be described as seriously disabled."

The survey report also shows that the percentage of disabled elderly to aging population in rural area is almost 18 percentage point higher than that of urban areas.

Geographically speaking, the disabled elderly rate is lowest in Eastern part of the country, and relatively higher in Western region.

Experts say the ability for the elderly to take care themselves is largely related to their living conditions, especially economic ones.

It is estimated that the disabled elderly population will continue to grow, reaching 40 million in 2015.

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