Care leave introduced for only children to care for sick parents
Several provincial areas in China have introduced care leave for those born under China’s only-child policy, varying from 10 to 20 days, China News Service website (chinanews.com) reported today.
The policy allows the only child in a family to enjoy the right to take care leave when their parents are hospitalized. Parents to benefit from the policy must be aged at least 60 years. Wages and benefits remain the same for those who take the leave.
On May 27 last year, central China’s Henan Province implemented such nursing leave up to 20 days in a year, followed by the provinces of Fujian, Hainan, and the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. Such policies are reportedly being considered in the provinces of Sichuan and Hubei and Chongqing City.
Quite a lot of elderly people have applauded the policy and expected it could be carried out nationwide.
“Our generation face aggravated pressure to provide for four parents after getting married,” said Liu Qianqian, who works for a large domestic enterprise in Beijing, “with intensive workloads on one hand and aging parents who need our help more and more on the other.” She also expressed concern about the implementation of the policy as even two-day weekends cannot be guaranteed in some private enterprises at the moment.
China's one-child policy, introduced at the end of the 1970s and abandoned at the beginning of 2016, achieved what it set out to do: rein in growth of the country's already vast population.
China allowed all married couples to have two children starting from 2016. This follows an earlier policy easing in 2013 that allowed couples to have a second child if either parent was an only child. The policy shift was in response to China's rapidly aging population.
As of 2016, China had more than 230 million citizens aged over 60, accounting for 16.7 percent of the whole population, according to the latest statistics released by the Ministry of Civil Affairs.
