Ageism: Negative Stereotypes and Prejudice Towards People Based on Their Age Leads to Poorer Health, Social Isolation…

Combatting ageism

The report notes that policies and laws that address ageism, educational activities that enhance empathy and dispel misconceptions, and intergenerational activities that reduce prejudice all help decrease ageism.

All countries and stakeholders are encouraged to use evidence-based strategies, improve data collection and research and work together to build a movement to change how we think, feel and act towards age and ageing, and to advance progress on the UN Decade of Healthy Ageing.

The Global report on ageism compiles the best evidence on the scale, the impact and the determinants of ageism, effective strategies to tackle the problem and recommendations for action to create a world fit for all ages. The report is directed at policymakers, practitioners, researchers, development agencies and members of the private sector and civil society. 

• • Ageism arises when age is used to categorize and divide people in ways that lead to harm, disadvantage, and injustice. It can take many forms including prejudicial attitudes, discriminatory acts, and institutional policies and practices that perpetuate stereotypical beliefs.

• • Prevalence figures based on a survey of 83 034 people in 57 countries found one in every two people held moderately or highly ageist attitudes (i.e. stereotypes and prejudice). More information: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/17/9/3159.

• Excess costs of health care: Ageism influences health through three pathways: psychological, behavioural and physiological. Psychologically, negative age stereotypes can exacerbate stress; behaviourally, negative self-perceptions of ageing predict worse health behaviour, such as noncompliance with prescribed medications; physiologically, negative age stereotypes predict detrimental brain changes decades later, including the accumulation of plaques and tangles and reduction in the size of the hippocampus.

  In the USA, ageism led to excess costs of US$63 billion for a broad range of health conditions during one year. This amounts to US$1 of every US$7 spent on the eight most expensive health conditions for all Americans over the age of 60 during one year. The excess health care spending due to ageism was derived from the following: (a) number of Americans aged 60 years or older in 2013; (b) prevalence of interpersonal and self-directed ageism based on percentage of people that agree to the following statements: “You are treated with less courtesy or respect than other people”, “Forgetfulness is a natural occurrence just from growing old” and “The older I get the more useless I feel.” (c) evidence of the impact of such ageist statements on the eight health conditions; (d) prevalence of the eight health conditions in 2013, the most recent year for which health care spending was available; and (e) Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) costs per person of the eight health conditions in 2013.  More information: https://academic.oup.com/gerontologist/article/60/1/174/5166947.

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*SOURCE: WHO. Go to ORIGINAL.
2021 Human Wrongs Watch