Until a few decades ago, rural people were not so mobile and used to establish neighborhood security organizations to safeguard their villages. As a result, the crime rate in the countryside was low. But the times have changed. A majority of the able-bodied people have left the countryside and many of the houses are empty. And elderly people, especially women, and children living in such houses become easy targets of criminals.

Since migration of workers from villages to cities cannot be stopped, the authorities should assume the responsibility of taking care of "empty nest" senior citizens and "left behind" children and protecting them from criminal assaults. To begin with, the authorities should strengthen the public security system by increasing the number of police officers per police station and outpost, organizing regular patrols and installing CCTV cameras at vantage points in villages to provide better protection for elderly people.

One of the noticeable details in the reports on the Xiayi incident is that the attacks on elderly people have stopped in a village after a new rural reconstruction project was launched there to enable senior citizens to live together. Elderly people can be better protected and get better care if they stay in groups in special homes. But in many poor rural areas, public services and resources to support elderly people are also poor.

The need, therefore, is to boost such services and allocate more of such resources to help senior citizens in the countryside. Economic progress and urbanization have forced elderly people to change their traditional, peaceful pastoral lifestyle and live a lonely life. The least the authorities could do, therefore, is to prevent these innocent folks from becoming victims of modern society.

The author is a writer with China Daily. wangyiqing@chinadaily.com.cn.