Trentino Alto Adige and Veneto are among the regions with the longest-living populations in Italy: there are about two thousand more 90-year-olds each year. But demand for care is increasing-more than 600 thousand over-65s with 2 or more chronic diseases and 180 thousand dependent elderly. Life expectancy in Veneto is for males 85 years old and for females. In Trentino men can hope to live to 81 1/2 years and women to 86.

In Veneto there are about 1.5 million people over 65, and of these more than 600 thousand have 2 or more chronic diseases. In Trentino-South Tyrol there are about 230 thousand over 65 with 66% of over 75s suffering from 2 or more chronic diseases. As age progresses, the elderly suffering from at least 2 diseases become the majority, reaching almost two-thirds of the total over age 85.

What must be deduced from these data, which in any case manifest a long-known trend, is that an increasingly older society is also a society that gets sicker and consequently requires more care.