Responsibility for Elderly Often by Unpaid Caregivers

In Connecticut, 486,000 people -- more than one in eight state residents -- were providing care to an adult with limitations in his or her activities at any given point in 2009, according to the report by AARP Public Policy Institute. A CT Mirror article highlights some of their stories. An estimated 42 million Americans act as unpaid caregivers, forming what experts call the backbone of the long-term care system. They far outnumber the home care workforce, providing services that one report estimated would cost $450 billion if performed by paid workers.