Cultures That Celebrate Aging And Respect Their Elders: Greek

Aging isn't just a biological process -- it's also very much a cultural one. 

Different cultures have different attitudes and practices around aging and death, and these cultural perspectives can have a huge effect on our experience of getting older.

While many cultures celebrate the aging process and venerate their elders, in Western cultures -- where youth is fetishized and the elderly are commonly removed from the community and relegated to hospitals and nursing homes -- aging can become a shameful experience. Physical signs of human aging tend to be regarded with distaste, and aging is often depicted in a negative light in popular culture, if it is even depicted at all.

"There's so much shame in our culture around aging and death," Koshin Paley Ellison, Buddhist monk and co-founder of the New York Zen Center for Contemplative Care, told the Huffington Post. "People themselves when they're aging feel that there's something wrong with them and they're losing value."
Psychologist Erik Erickson argued that the Western fear of aging keeps us from living full lives. "Lacking a culturally viable ideal of old age, our civilization does not really harbor a concept of the whole of life," he wrote.


Here's what we can learn from other cultures, both past and present, about embracing the aging process. 

Lets Talk First of Greek:

"Old man" isn't a bad word in Greek.

The Western cultural stigma around aging and death doesn't exist in Greece. In Greek and Greek-American culture, old age is honored and celebrated, and respect for elders is central to the family.  

Arianna Huffington described an experience of Greek elderly respect in her book, On Becoming Fearless: 
"Ten years ago I visited the monastery of Tharri on the island of Rhodes with my children. There, as in all of Greece, abbots are addressed by everyone as 'Geronda,' which means 'old man.' Abbesses are called 'Gerondissa.' Not exactly terms of endearment in my adopted home. The idea of honoring old age, indeed identifying it with wisdom and closeness to God, is in startling contrast to the way we treat aging in America." 

Courtesy: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/02/25/what-other-cultures-can-teach_n_4834228.html?ir=India

“We were older then, we are younger now”

Dr John Beard, Director, Ageing and Life Course

When is someone old?

One question that I am often asked is “When is someone old?"

 
The more I work in the field of healthy ageing, the more difficulty I have providing an answer. There are, of course, definitions that are used for statistical purposes – the UN has historically adopted 60 years as a cut-off. But the link between chronological age and the health and functional status of an individual is tenuous at best. 

And many other factors may have just as significant an influence on an older person’s ability to do the things they value. For example, the attitude of business to employing older people is likely to have a very strong influence on whether they can continue to work. Similarly, the presence of disabled access public transport can help determine whether an older person gets where they want to go, regardless of any functional limitations they may have.

So this is not just a question for statisticians. I am 59 years old and have just welcomed a gorgeous son to my family. I seem to be in pretty good health. Next year my son will be 1 and I will be 60. Will I be old?
Increasing numbers of people the world over are likely to ask themselves the same thing. By 2050, the world’s population aged 60 years and older is expected to total 2 billion – up from 841 million today. Eighty per cent of these people will live in what are now low- or middle-income countries. 

Our goal should be for long life in good health

This is a huge success for public health. But our goal should be for people not just to live longer, but to have healthier, more fulfilling lives.
To achieve this, much will have to change. Unfortunately, the information we have on what might work and what doesn’t is very limited. For example, while we know people are living longer, we do not yet know whether they are living those additional years in good or poor health. It seems likely this will depend considerably on where you live. 

Dispelling outdated and “ageist” perspectives

We are not simply challenged by knowledge gaps. We are held back by myths that have emerged in an effort to fill these gaps. These often reinforce outdated and “ageist” perspectives on what getting older means for the individual and for society. 

One example is the myth that providing health services for an ageing population will necessarily be unaffordable. This does not fit with the evidence which shows that the last 18 months of life place most demand on health systems, regardless of how old you are. And, interestingly, the costs of health care in the last 18 months of life appear to drop significantly when someone reaches 80, when conventional health services are often replaced by different forms of long-term care. 

Furthermore, research suggests that while population ageing will certainly lead to an increase in expenditure on health care, the introduction of new technologies and treatments is likely to have a much bigger impact, as is the natural tendency for countries and individuals to spend more on health as they get richer. There are also many inefficiencies in most health systems that have an enormous influence on costs. 

It is now becoming clear that the way we design services makes a difference too. Hospitals designed to manage individual diseases separately have much poorer outcomes for older patients than those that provide holistic and coordinated care. This is because as we get older, the health conditions we experience change. Young people may have single, curable disorders, but older people are more likely to experience chronic conditions, and experience more than one of them at a time. 


Read in Detail: http://www.who.int/mediacentre/commentaries/ageing/en/

 

 

International Day against Elder Abuse WEAAD 2012 : AGE calls for an EU quality framework for long-term care

 

Press release 14/06/12 - Stop elder abuse: AGE calls for an EU quality framework for long-term care

International Day against Elder Abuse (en français plus bas)

Stop elder abuse: AGE calls for an EU quality framework for long-term care to support the wellbeing and dignity of older people

“With the ageing of the population and the major social and economic reforms this demographic change will entail, finding ways of preventing elder abuse and ensuring a dignified life in old age will be a major challenge across the EU and needs be at the core of the current EU active and healthy ageing policies”, highlights Anne-Sophie Parent, AGE Secretary-General, on the eve of the International Day against Elder Abuse on 15 June.

In the last few years, the issue of abuse and negligence against vulnerable older people has gained importance at European and national levels. Public authorities, policy makers, care providers and end users’ organisations are now aware that elder abuse and neglect is a serious infringement to human rights that can no longer be tolerated, and measures must be put in place to ensure that older persons are adequately protected and can enjoy a dignified old age even when they become dependent on others for care and assistance.

We all know cases of older people abused and neglected, and these poor practices can be found in all EU countries and in all care settings, at home, in the community or in institutions. Some of these cases are examples of intentional abuse and neglect but the vast majority of them reflect just unintentional ‘bad care’ which affect the wellbeing and dignity of older vulnerable persons. However, many positive experiences and (real) success stories exist as well across Europe.  Most of the time, carers - both formal and informal - are very devoted and go out of their way to provide the best care they can to the older person in need of assistance. 

In our view the best way to prevent ‘bad care’ and elder abuse is by improving the quality of care and support we provide to older people in need of care and assistance. As part of the EU funded WeDO project, AGE and a group of partners from 12 countries, are developing a European Quality Framework for Long-Term Care which includes quality principles and recommendations for the implementation of these principles which are based on the European Charter of Rights and Responsibilities of older people in need of long-term care and assistance, developed in 2010. The European Quality Framework for Long-term care will be presented at the European Parliament on 14 November at the European Parliament in Brussels.

About AGE Platform Europe:

AGE Platform Europe (formerly AGE - the European Older People's Platform) is a European network of organisation of people aged 50+ and represents over 30 million older people in Europe. AGE aims to voice and promote the interests of the 150 million inhabitants aged 50+ in the European Union and to raise awareness of the issues that concern them most. www.age-platform.eu

AGE Platform Europe is the coordinator of the WeDO project which develops the EU quality framework for older people in need of care and assistance. More information at: www.wedo-partnership.eu.

For more information, please contact:

Anne Mélard

Information and Communication Officer

AGE Platform Europe

www.age-platform.eu

Tel: +32 2 280 14 70

Fax: +32 2 280 15 22

E-mail: anne.melard@age-platform.eu

Or

Maude Luherne

WeDO project coordinator

AGE Platform Europe

www.wedo-partnership.eu

maude.luherne@age-platform.eu

 Brussels, 14 June 2012