HOPE I DIE BEFORE I GET OLD: Who Will Care for ‘Kinless’ Seniors? Nearly one million Americans have no immediate family members to provide assistance if needed. The number is expected to grow.

Lynne Ingersoll and her cat, Jesse, spent a quiet Thanksgiving Day together in her small bungalow in Blue Island, Ill.

A retired librarian, Ms. Ingersoll never married or had children. At 77, she has outlived her parents, three partners, her two closest friends, five dogs and eight cats.

When her sister died three years ago, Ms. Ingersoll joined the ranks of older Americans considered “kinless”: without partners or spouses, children or siblings. Covid-19 has largely suspended her occasional get-togethers with friends, too. Now, she said, “my social life consists of doctors and store clerks — that’s a joke, but it’s pretty much true.”

Like many older adults, Ms. Ingersoll copes with an array of health problems: kidney disease, asthma, heart disease requiring a pacemaker, arthritis that makes walking difficult even with a cane. She’s managing, but “I can see a time when that’s not going to be true,” she said. “I’m not sure what I’m going to do about it.”

This is the final chapter of Life of Julia that the Obama campaign left out. The solution offered will probably be some sort of euthanasia program, as is already appearing in Canada.

Related: Singles can snuggle this giant emotional support bear — and it doesn’t snore. “The Loving Bear Puffy is the shape and size of a male human body — but has the head of a teddy bear. Puffy is ‘a very personal product invented by an ordinary woman who is afraid of being alone,’ the company said. The 5-foot, 7-inch oversize plush bear — weighing just 7 pounds — is $160 and ‘replaces the need for the physical presence of a person in various moments and situations of everyday life, especially during long lonely nights.'”