Ageing in the developing countries of Asia and the Pacific--implications for health care

While ageing is still clearly not a high priority issue for health planners, policy makers and clinicians in developing countries of Asia and the Pacific, there will be a growing need in coming years to pay more and more attention to the important health issues associated with population ageing in countries which make up this region of the world. This paper reports some of the relevant findings of a WHO sponsored cross national study of the health and social aspects of ageing in four of the countries, namely Korea, the Philippines, Fiji and Malaysia. The key findings are compared and contrasted with those of a similar WHO eleven country study in Europe. The paper argues that there is an urgent need to develop health care strategies which will minimise the impact of population ageing and will maintain the growing numbers of old people in relatively good physical and mental health through preventive measures and through programmes directed to the maintenance of physical and mental health.