Turkey’s elderly population increases by 20 pct since 2014

A report by the Turkish Statistical Institute (TUİK) published on March 18 revealed that the segment of the Turkish population that is above the age of 65 had increased by 20% since 2014, reaching 9.1 percent of the general population. However, it noted that 62.8% of the elderly population was below 74.

Thursday March 19 2020 04:33 pm

Duvar English

A report published on March 18 by the Turkish Statistical Institute (TUİK) revealed the portion of Turkey’s population aged 65 and above has grown by 21.9 percent in the past five years.

In 2019, number of elderly people was said to be 7,550,727. In 2014, that number was 6,192,962, the report entitled “The Elderly Through Statistics” revealed.

While the elderly make up 9.1 percent of the population, 55.8 percent of people within this group are women.

By 2023, the percentage of the elderly in the general population is projected to rise to 10.2 percent of the population. By 2028, that number will reach 25.6 percent of the population; meaning one of every four people in the population will be above 65 years old.

While 23.5 percent of Turkey’s households includes an older individual, some 1,373,521 older persons live alone, three fourths of which are women.

Some16.4 of Turkey’s older citizens live in poverty, down from 18.3percent in 2014.

Ayoung elderly population

Turkey’s current population of elderly individuals are relatively young with 62 percent of those above 65 falling below or at 74 years old.

Almost one third, 28.2 percent of the population is between the ages of 75 and 84, and the remaining 9.1 percent are above 85.

Noting that having an elderly population that accounts for 10% of the overall population is the criteria for having an “old population,” the report stated that Turkey’s overall population remains younger than that of most countries whose older population percentage is around 10 percent.

The countries with the oldest populations in the world are Monaco, Japan and Germany, with respective percentages of elderly people at 34.1 percent, 28.8 percent and 22.7 percent.

Turkey’s elderly use the internet at a rate of 19.8 percent, a number that has quadrupled since 2014.