Chinese kindergartens pivot to senior care as population ages

Participants practising a dance at a kindergarten-turned-elderly centre in Taiyuan, in China’s northern Shanxi province. - PHOTO: AFP

TAIYUAN, China (AFP): Senior citizens sway to old-time tunes at a former kindergarten in northern China, as educators turn their sights away from children in the face of a rapidly ageing population and a baby bust.

Hundreds of millions of Chinese are set to enter old age in the coming decades while the country's chronically low birth rate leaves ever fewer people to replace them, official statistics show.