THE Jamaican nation is under siege on so many fronts that it is easy to get caught up in total negativity and despondency.

It becomes easy to forget that there are positives around us such as told in yesterday’s Sunday Observer of the Golden Age Home on St Joseph’s Avenue in east central Kingston.

The home, which caters for the elderly indigent in Kingston and St Andrew, is celebrating its 25th anniversary. And if we are to go by the Sunday Observer report, things have mostly gone well.

To quote the assistant administrator of the home, Ms Jacqueline Brown, “We have come a long way from Eventide (Home). It’s (the Golden Age Home) a home away from home…”

For those too young to be familiar with the Eventide reference, that just happens to capture one of the more tragic episodes of latter 20th century Jamaican history. In fact, those of older vintage still wince at the memory.

To summarise, on May 20, 1980, a fire — the origin of which was never determined by officialdom — razed the female Myers Ward at Eventide Home for the Aged on Slipe Pen Road causing the loss of 153 elderly women. Searchers recovered the bodies of 144 victims from the rubble of the more than 100-year-old wooden building.

Two of those injured in the fire eventually succumbed in hospital. Seven who were never accounted for, were eventually presumed dead.

For the Jamaican society at the time there was not just mourning but great shame. For the elderly at Eventide were housed in horrific conditions unbecoming of a society claiming to be civilised. Hence that comment from Ms Brown.

The Golden Age Home was an outgrowth of the soul searching that followed the Eventide tragedy, underlining the old adage that even out of bad can come some good. As this newspaper has suggested before in this space, it is something to consider in the aftermath of last May’s tragedy that left seven teenaged girls dead at the State-run Armadale Juvenile Correctional Centre in St Ann.

And, while we stand ready to be corrected, this newspaper gets the sense that all across Jamaica, homes for the elderly are much improved on how they were 30 years ago. Perhaps largely as a result of the Eventide experience.

A key element of these homes’ sustainability, we believe, has been the assistance received from corporate and individual sponsors and donors over the years.

It’s possible, though, that the Golden Age Home’s 25th anniversary could not have come at a more opportune time, for these are days of budget cuts and IMF conditionalities that will likely result in the social/welfare sector suffering cutbacks in State allocations.

As such, those involved in the 25th anniversary celebrations should use the opportunity to acquaint potential donors not only with the needs of the Golden Age Home, but of other similar institutions across the country. We should all seek to ensure that whatever shortages and inadequacies may flow from the Government’s economic bind will in no way result in a deterioration of care for those unable to help themselves.