Written By Alan Good
Last edition we looked at the increasing number of seniors that is even now impinging on things like social services, health care, and home care. The tsunami, as it’s described, is here, so how we are doing locally?
Countries that are aging the fastest, including Canada, Japan, South Korea and Italy, have long life expectancies, high levels of education and robust social protection systems. Population aging, in other words, is a marker of national success, not failure.
Yet public debate still treats older adults primarily as a cost: hospital beds, long-term care spaces, income supports.
Others see the value seniors lend to society. Things like volunteering in hospitals and caring for other seniors through various agencies, like the Canadian Centre for Activity and Aging in London. The goal of any policy should not be to “reverse” aging, but to ensure people of all ages can live well. And that doesn’t occur in a lab or clinic but in neighbourhoods and communities shaped by work, housing, transit, caregiving, air quality and income.
Two people of the same chronological age can age very differently depending on where and how they live. A change in the antiquated health-care system is underway, but is it occurring fast enough? If Canadians want to thrive in 2067, we need a serious investment in social care and community-based services that keep people healthier for longer and living at home at a fraction of the cost of institutional care.
This could be a place where older adults can remain in their communities, supported affordably and with dignity. Where cities and rural areas alike offer clean air, accessible transit and vibrant community hubs. An area where housing incentives allow younger adults to afford to keep their aging parents and grandparents at home. After all, seniors can usually make good daycare providers, the cost for daycare, and transportation and concern to pick them up on time, vanish.
Every major policy affecting older adults should be tested against real evidence, rather than outdated assumptions about dependency.
“We need trust to design new models of care, new forms of housing and new income systems that reflect longer lives,” states Parminder Raina, a Scientific Director of the McMaster Institute for Research on Aging. “We need it to share health and social data in ways that protect privacy while enabling research at scale, including large cohorts such as the Canadian Longitudinal Study on Aging. And we need it to rebuild confidence in institutions that many Canadians feel are no longer working for them.”
He adds that when trust is high, ambitious changes become possible. Changes like national partnerships that bring together governments, researchers, industry and community organizations to test new solutions plus global collaborations that position Canada as a leader in healthy longevity and the “longevity economy”.
“We can treat our aging population as a fiscal threat or an opportunity to redesign our communities, systems and expectations for the better,” Raina challenges.
Canada could be known not just for universal health care by 2067, but a society where people of all ages live longer lives of purpose, connection and joy. It won’t happen magically. But it can happen and is within our reach.
