The number of people aged over 60 is set to double by 2050. Are we prepared?

Image: REUTERS/Issei Kato

Written by
Derek Yach
Chief Health Officer, Vitality Group
Viviana Roseth

By 2020, individuals aged 60 and older will be greater in number than children younger than five. By 2050, the world’s older adult population will have doubled to 2 billion. These numbers are striking. Cognitive decline, strained pension schemes, and burgeoning healthcare costs: are we prepared for tomorrow’s complex longevity challenges?

These challenges provide unique opportunities and considerable threats if we fail to act soon. Governments and insurers monetize health and have a direct interest in actively promoting longevity. But they are not alone. All sectors and stakeholders have a role to play in enabling progress toward the creation of healthy and vibrant older societies.

      

Image: Bank of America Merrill Lynch. Thematic Investing: 

The Silver Dollar – longevity revolution primer

Financial services organizations – particularly banks and insurers – have a fiduciary duty to uphold for their customers. Financial protection is needed for preventing financial abuse of the elderly. Technologies predicted by the Fourth Industrial Revolution – ranging from wearables and in-home sensors to artificial intelligence and advanced algorithms – can support the health and wealth of older adults. Regulations and policies must accompany these technological advancements.

As global citizens advocating for and leading positive change, how can we spur action to proactively address the impacts of ageing on human and financial wellbeing? Here are five recommendations:

Create “whealthcare”

A growing number of academics and businesses are examining the impacts of health and wealth together. Skills in financial reasoning are among the first to erode with cognitive changes to the brain. Training professionals in cognitive impairment and ageing are needed to support better communication across a majority of institutions. Physicians should be trained and encouraged to discuss financial and personal affairs with their patients.

Life-course approach

The value of activities undertaken to promote health and wealth in early life become increasingly apparent in later life. Financial planners must work with their clients to develop financial plans that address the effects of cognitive decline across the life course. Urban planners must build housing, transport, and entire cities for an ageing global population.

Collaborative research

Research is needed to better bridge the divide between health and wealth. For healthy ageing, additional research is needed on the determinants of longevity and its most effective interventions. For wealth, predictors and patterns of financial abuse and fraud is required. Academic researchers and financial institutions must collaborate to generate cross-cutting research on healthy ageing and financial wellbeing.

Develop innovative technologies

Personalized technologies with the potential to facilitate healthy ageing and the prevention of financial fraud among older adults are gradually emerging. These technologies must be developed for ease-of-use and functionality, while maintaining appropriate safeguards on data protection and privacy. Artificial intelligence and robotics will be enablers of enhanced function and protection, though they will require collective action to ensure their widespread benefits.

Age-friendly policies

The regulatory and policy environment needs to be adapted for ageing populations. This may include modifications to caregiver oversight and power of attorney statutes that serve to prevent financial fraud and abuse. Granting access to third-parties, including caregivers, must become the new norm in a world of ageing populations.

These recommendations are inspirational and ambitious. They cannot be fulfilled by one individual or organization acting alone. It will demand the deliberate foresight and collaboration among diverse stakeholders to facilitate the creation of sustained health and wealth for older adults. They will take cooperation and dedication, though the results are worth the investment.

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Obama wants to send people to Mars by the 2030s. Here's what awaits them

President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama talk with astronauts at the Kennedy Space Center at Cape Canaveral in 2011.

Image: REUTERS/Larry Downing

Barack Obama wants to get humans to Mars and back by the 2030s, with the ultimate goal of a long-term stay on the Red Planet.

In an opinion piece for CNN, the US President spoke of his boyhood fascination with space travel and revealed his ambitions for “the next chapter of America’s story in space”.

Getting people to Mars will require ongoing collaboration between government and private innovators, he wrote.

“The next step is to reach beyond the bounds of Earth's orbit. I'm excited to announce that we are working with our commercial partners to build new habitats that can sustain and transport astronauts on long-duration missions in deep space.

“These missions will teach us how humans can live far from Earth – something we'll need for the long journey to Mars.”

Image: NASA

Human colonization

After Earth, Mars has the next best climate in our solar system for supporting life. The days are similar (lasting 24 hours and 40 minutes), and liquid water once flowed on the surface. But the Red Planet's conditions are still extremely inhospitable.

"Exploring Mars with humans is an imperative, to understand whether or not life ever evolved on the Red Planet, and the implications of that life for life here on Earth," said Ellen R. Stofan, NASA Chief Scientist.

"But Mars is hard – getting there, living there, returning home.

Think of it more like trying to set up a base in Antarctica – extremely harsh conditions, totally inhospitable to us, reliant on systems we have to bring from home."

Just how hard would it be to set up home on Mars? Here are a few of the challenges that would await the first human visitors.

Temperature

The average temperature on Earth is 14 degrees Celsius. On Mars it’s -63C. That’s similar to the average temperature at the South Pole in winter.

Image: NASA

Gravity

On Mars you’d experience 62.5% less gravity than you’re used to on Earth. If you weighed 100lb on Earth, you’d probably only weigh 38lb on Mars.

Image: NASA

The effects of microgravity on astronauts’ health include wasting of muscle and bone and back problems. NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA) have been developing a tight-fitting ‘skinsuit’ that compresses the body to help counteract the problems resulting from reduced pressure and gravity.

Image: NASA–Waldie

Atmosphere

Earth’s atmosphere is over 100 times denser than Mars’, which is mostly made up of carbon dioxide with some water vapour.

Image: NASA

Length of day/year

Although the length of days on Earth and Mars are similar, a Martian year lasts almost twice as long.

This is because it takes a year for a planet to orbit the sun and Mars is further away from the sun than Earth (on average 142 million miles compared to 93 million miles).

Image: NASA

Written by

Rosamond Hutt, Formative Content

The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and not the World Economic Forum.

weforum.org

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