By Antonio Tejeda Encinas, President of PCDD-Participación Ciudadana. Democracia. Derechos Digitales
A Tragedy That Does Not Make Headlines
The long-term care crisis in the Canary Islands is an alarming reality that nevertheless does not receive the media attention it deserves. Thousands of extremely vulnerable people are trapped in a bureaucratic system that condemns them to oblivion and, in many cases, to death before they receive the help they need.
The long-term care crisis in the Canary Islands is not merely an administrative problem, but the reflection of a system in which bureaucracy, indifference and inequality intertwine to perpetuate the abandonment of the most vulnerable. Through cinema, films such as Network, Dr. Strangelove and El Hoyo allow us to understand—from different angles—how structural failures can condemn thousands of people to invisibility, despair and, in many cases, death before they receive help.
“Network” and the Media Invisibility of Long-Term Care
Network shows how the media decide what matters and what does not. The long-term care crisis in the Canary Islands is subject to this phenomenon: it does not interest audiences and therefore generates no real political pressure. There are no mass protests or extensive media coverage.
The data, however, are alarming:
- The Canary Islands have the second-longest delay in processing long-term care applications, with an average wait of 12.5 months in 2022, according to the System for Autonomy and Care for Dependency (SAAD). Projections for 2025 suggest that this wait will exceed 14 months, in breach of the statutory six-month period.
- In 2022, more than 6,500 people died while on waiting lists across Spain, according to the Association of Directors and Managers of Social Services. Extrapolating from that figure, around 260 people in the Canary Islands may have died that year before receiving help.
- In 2023, 28,500 people were waiting for a benefit in the Canary Islands, according to the Canary Islands Department of Social Rights. In 2024, the figure was around 30,000, according to complaints by the Spanish Confederation of Organizations for Older People (CEOMA).
In Network, the protagonist becomes a media sensation by expressing his despair live on air. In real life, dependent people in the Canary Islands have no such space in which to express their situation. They simply disappear without a sound.
“Dr. Strangelove” and the Bureaucracy That Kills
Dr. Strangelove shows how incompetence and administrative errors can lead to destruction. The Dependency Law in the Canary Islands operates according to similar logic. Although the system is designed to help the most vulnerable, in practice it has become a mechanism that delays and, in many cases, denies the assistance they need.
The reasons include:
- Forty percent of applicants abandon the process because of its complexity, according to the Spanish Ombudsman in 2023.
- The 2022 Canary Islands Audit confirmed that the health and social-welfare departments do not share data, delaying diagnoses and assistance.
- The central government allocated €96 million to the Canary Islands for long-term care in 2024, but associations such as CEOMA are demanding €138 million to cover basic needs, indicating a funding gap of more than 30%.
In Dr. Strangelove, nuclear war is unleashed by a system designed to be “efficient” but which proves unworkable. In the Canary Islands, long-term care is managed with a similar bureaucratic coldness: paperwork matters more than the person.
“El Hoyo” and the Hierarchy of Despair
El Hoyo presents a hierarchical system in which those at the top benefit while those below struggle to survive. The parallel with long-term care management in the Canary Islands is clear:
- A private care home costs €1,800 per month, according to the Platform for Older People and Pensioners in 2023, an amount beyond the reach of pensioners whose average income is €1,100, according to INE.
- Forty-one percent of dependent people in the Canary Islands live in households with incomes below €1,000 per month, according to Cáritas in 2023. For them, public assistance is not a right, but a race between the waiting list and death.
- Energy poverty affects 34% of households with dependent members, according to the 2024 Foessa Report. Many must choose between buying medicine and paying the electricity bill.
In El Hoyo, those at the top help themselves first and leave those below to survive as best they can. In real life, there is no “administrator” to regulate the flow of resources and no revolution to change the structure. There is only waiting, despair and abandonment.
How Much Longer Will We Endure This Disgrace?
The three films examined are not merely metaphors for the problem, but diagnoses of a society built on flawed foundations:
- If the media do not consider it important, the problem does not exist. The long-term care crisis in the Canary Islands barely makes the headlines in major national media. Without media pressure, there is no political pressure.
- If bureaucracy controls everything, the solution never arrives. Dependent people and their families must contend not only with illness or disability, but with an administrative maze that exhausts them and leaves them with no alternatives.
- If society is structured in tiers of privilege, the weakest always lose. Those who can afford a private care home survive. Those who depend on the public system wait until it is too late.
And worst of all: we know this is how it works, yet we continue to tolerate it.
In Network, Howard Beale becomes a media sensation by shouting his despair on television: “I’m as mad as hell, and I’m not going to take this anymore!”.
If nothing changes, CEOMA projections warn that 20,000 people could die while on waiting lists in the Canary Islands before 2030. The question is clear:
