agingandsociety

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From Medical News Today

Researchers have found that women are 40% more likely to be admitted in to a care home than men because they are often married to older partners who are unable to provide care for them as a result of their age-related frailty.

The study, entitled “Gender differences in care home admission risk: Partner’s age explains the higher risk for women,” is published in the journal Age and Ageing.

The researchers used data from the Northern Ireland Longitudinal Study (NILS), which they obtained from the Northern Ireland Health Card registration system and is linked to the 2001 Census return, and examined NILS members who, at the time, were 65 years or older and lived with their partner, as a couple, in the same household.

20.830 people over the age of 65 years lived in a two-person household with their partner.

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From ScienceDaily

Aging may seem unavoidable, but that’s not necessarily so when it comes to the brain. So say researchers in the April 27th issue of the Cell Press journal Trends in Cognitive Sciences based on counterintuitive evidence that it is what you do in old age that matters when it comes to maintaining a youthful brain rather than what you did earlier in life.

“Although some memory functions do tend to decline as we get older, several elderly show well-preserved functioning and this is related to a well-preserved, youth-like brain,” says Lars Nyberg, Professor of Neuroscience at Umeå University in Sweden.

Education won’t save your brain — PhDs are as likely as high school dropouts to experience memory loss with old age, the researchers say. Don’t count on your job either. Those with a complex or demanding career may enjoy a limited advantage, but those benefits quickly dwindle after retirement. Engagement is the secret to success. Those who are socially, mentally and physically stimulated reliably show greater cognitive performance with a brain that appears younger than its years.

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An elderly woman walks by a shrine in Tokyo on Dec. 31, 2009. Photo by Junji Kurokawa from AP File

From MSNBC.com

Japan’s rapid aging means the national population of 128 million will shrink by one-third by 2060 and seniors will account for 40 percent of people, placing a greater burden on the shrinking work force population to support the social security and tax systems.

The population estimate released Monday by the Health and Welfare Ministry paints a grim future.

In 2060, Japan will have 87 million people. The number of people 65 or older will nearly double to 40 percent, while the national work force of people between ages 15 and 65 will shrink to about half of the total population, according to the estimate, made by the National Institute of Population and Social Security Research.

The total fertility rate, or the expected number of children born per woman during lifetime, in 2060 is estimated at 1.35, down from 1.39 in 2010 — well below more than 2 needed to keep the country’s population from declining. But the average Japanese will continue to live longer. The average life expectancy for 2060 is projected at 90.93 for women, up from 86.39 in 2010, and 84.19 years for men, up from 79.64 years.

“The trend of the aging society will continue and it is hard to expect the birth rate to rise significantly,” Chief Cabinet Secretary Osamu Fujimura told a news conference. “Thus, comprehensive tax and social security reform is needed.”

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Photo by Brett Ryder

From the Economist

“A LAZY bastard living in a suit” is Leonard Cohen’s description of himself in his new album, “Old Ideas”. Mr Cohen is certainly fond of wearing a suit, on and off stage. But lazy seems a bit harsh. He is 77, which is 12 years beyond the normal retirement age in Canada, where he was born. But there is no sign of his laying down his guitar. He spent 2008-10 on tour, performing on stage in Barcelona on his 75th birthday. “Old Ideas” has won widespread acclaim. Mr Cohen says he has written enough songs for another album.

In the 1960s pop was a young person’s business. The Who hoped they died before they got old. Bob Dylan berated middle-aged squares like Mr Jones in “Ballad of a Thin Man”. But today age is no barrier to success. The Rolling Stones are still touring in their 60s. Bob Dylan’s songwriting skills, if not his vocal chords, have survived intact. Sir Paul McCartney warbles on.

It is time to do for enterprise what such ageing rockers have done for pop music: explode the myth that it is a monopoly of the young. This idea has been powerfully reinforced by the latest tech boom: Facebook, Google and Groupon were all founded by people in their 20s or teens. Mark Zuckerberg, aged 27, will soon be able to count his years on earth in billions of dollars. But the trend is not confined to tech: Michael Reger was a founder of one of America’s most innovative energy companies, Northern Oil and Gas, aged 30.

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