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When Francine Pratte died in her Trois-Rivières home in October 2015, it took more than a month before anyone realized it.
In a report issued Tuesday, Quebec coroner Raynald Gauthier reported that the concierge of the building, who had been working there five years, did not even know the 65-year-old woman, who died of an acute coronary insufficiency.
She was “socially isolated,” Gauthier wrote. Her family did not visit, and she received a call from one of her sons about once a month.
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The strong, putrid smell emanating from her home in a building owned by the Trois-Rivières municipal housing office finally led authorities to enter.
Gauthier, who was called to the scene, said the body bore traces of mummification.
Pratte was known to take daily medication. Her prescription specified that the last dose would have been taken on Oct. 17. She was found on Nov. 20.
“It’s heartbreaking to see elderly people who are so socially isolated, living in municipal housing units, can die and go without a phone call for so long before anyone becomes concerned,” Gauthier said in his report.
“Today, people have 1.8 kids per family on average, not 10 like in the past. Society requires us to travel around the world, which is perfect and normal, but it’s detrimental to human relations,” said Danis Prud’homme, general director of FADOQ network, a resource for Quebec’s elderly population.
He recommended the municipal housing board encourage seniors who live alone or have reduced independence to join Quebec’s Pair program, an automated daily call service that makes sure everything is OK.
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He made the same suggestion to the Regroupement des offices d’habitation du Québec.
“It’s a fair recommendation if we’re alone,” Prud’homme said. “There are also measures such as bracelets with alarm systems built in. There’s all sorts of technology out there, but they need money.”
These types of solutions have their limits, he continued.
“At what point can we convince someone, ‘You’re alone, you need to sign up for this program’? It’s a lot more complicated than we think. If a person is autonomous and doesn’t want something, we can’t force them,” he said.
Beyond external solutions, Prud’homme encourages individual initiatives, understanding that there are limitations.
“We need to question how society can encourage volunteering in the first place. Do we encourage people to remain in the job market as long as they would like? The answer is often no.”
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