Appendix A
Summary of the Global Roadmap for Healthy Longevity
This appendix summarizes a global roadmap for achieving the vision of healthy longevity. The evidence base for the roadmap is contained within the chapters of the report. The commission defines healthy longevity as the following:
In healthy longevity, years of good health approach the biological life span, with physical, cognitive, and social functioning that enables well-being.
Societies achieving healthy longevity will benefit at large scale from enhanced human capital and contributions from older people. This will improve economic and societal well-being, as well as the success of young people.
The commission offers five overarching principles for healthy longevity:
- People of all ages, particularly older adults, reach their full potential to live life with good health, function, meaning, purpose, and dignity.
- Societies enable the best health and functioning that individuals at all ages are capable of attaining.
- Societies reduce disparities and enhance equity within and among countries to realize the well-being and contributions of all people, including those of older ages.
- The human, financial, and social capital of older people is realized for the benefit of all of society.
- Societies use data and meaningful metrics to track the achievement of outcomes and guide decision making.
Given that many sectors of society influence the ability of societies and individuals to achieve healthy longevity, the commission has formulated specific systems goals for achieving the overarching principles for healthy longevity (see Table A-1). Examples of specific structures and targets needed for achieving the goals are also included. To provide concrete suggestions for healthier, longer lives, the commission recommends a series of actions to be taken in the next 5 years.
TABLE A-1 Summary Table of the Global Roadmap for Healthy Longevity
Long-Term Goals for Longer and Healthier Lives in 2050 | Examples of Supporting Structures | Recommendations for the Next 5 Years |
---|---|---|
Cross-cutting | ||
Recommendation 7-1. By 2023, governments should establish calls to action to develop and implement data-driven, all-of-society plans for building organizations and social infrastructure needed to enable healthy longevity. Recommendation 7-2. International agencies, led by the World Health Organization, should work together and in concert with countries to reach consensus on metrics and surveillance mechanisms for routine data collection to measure healthy longevity. These data should be used to guide decision making with respect to prioritizing investments and monitoring outcomes and progress. |
||
Long-Term Goals for Longer and Healthier Lives in 2050 | Examples of Supporting Structures | Recommendations for the Next 5 Years |
---|---|---|
Longevity Dividend | ||
Key Targets:
|
||
Goal 1. Economic and social benefits generated by people living, working, volunteering, and engaging longer Goal 2. Social infrastructure, institutions, and business systems that enable safe and meaningful work and other community engagement at every stage of life |
|
Recommendation 3-1. Governments, in collaboration with the business sector, should design work environments and develop new policies that enable and encourage older adults to remain in the workforce longer by
|
Long-Term Goals for Longer and Healthier Lives in 2050 | Examples of Supporting Structures | Recommendations for the Next 5 Years |
---|---|---|
Goal 3. Education and training opportunities that promote participation in lifelong learning and growth |
|
Recommendation 3-2. Governments, employers, and educational institutions should prioritize investments in redesigning education systems to support lifelong learning and training. Governments should also invest in the science of learning and training for middle-aged and older adults. Specifically, employers, unions, and governments should support pilots that allow middle-aged and older adults to retool for multiple careers and/or participate as volunteers across their life span through the development of such incentives as
|
Long-Term Goals for Longer and Healthier Lives in 2050 | Examples of Supporting Structures | Recommendations for the Next 5 Years |
---|---|---|
Social Infrastructure | ||
Key Targets:
|
||
Goal 4. Social cohesion augmented by intergenerational connections and the creation of opportunities for purposeful engagement by older people at the family, community, and societal levels |
|
Recommendation 4-1. Governments should develop evidence-based, multipronged strategies for reducing ageism against any age group by
|
Long-Term Goals for Longer and Healthier Lives in 2050 | Examples of Supporting Structures | Recommendations for the Next 5 Years |
---|---|---|
Goal 5. Social protections and financial security that mitigate the effects of financial vulnerability at older ages |
|
Recommendation 4-2. By 2027, all governments should develop plans for ensuring basic financial security for older people.
Recommendation 4-3. To improve financial security in retirement, governments and employers should develop strategies for increasing financial literacy and mechanisms for promoting pension contributions, self-funded pensions, and lifelong savings. |
Long-Term Goals for Longer and Healthier Lives in 2050 | Examples of Supporting Structures | Recommendations for the Next 5 Years |
---|---|---|
Physical Environment Enablers | ||
Key Targets:
|
||
Goal 6. Physical environments and infrastructure that support functioning and engagement for people at older ages |
|
Recommendation 5-1. Governments and the private sector should partner to design user-centered and cohesion-enabling intergenerational communities for healthy longevity. Initiatives should include
|
Long-Term Goals for Longer and Healthier Lives in 2050 | Examples of Supporting Structures | Recommendations for the Next 5 Years |
---|---|---|
Health Systems | ||
Key Targets:
|
||
Goal 7. Integrated public health, social service, person-centered health care, and long-term care systems designed to extend years of good health and support the diverse health needs of older people |
|
Recommendation 6-1. To achieve the goal of the best possible health for older people, governments, over the next 5 years, should develop strategies to increase investments in robust public health systems that build and lead collective actions for promoting health at the population level and across the life course.
|
Long-Term Goals for Longer and Healthier Lives in 2050 | Examples of Supporting Structures | Recommendations for the Next 5 Years |
---|---|---|
|
Recommendation 6-2. Health care systems should shift to enabling healthy longevity. To catalyze such a shift, actions to be taken by 2027 include the following:
|
Long-Term Goals for Longer and Healthier Lives in 2050 | Examples of Supporting Structures | Recommendations for the Next 5 Years |
---|---|---|
Goal 8. Quality long-term care systems to ensure that people receive the care they require in the setting they desire for a life of meaning and dignity |
|
Recommendation 6-3. Governments should work with health and long-term care systems and researchers to develop strategies for making available culturally sensitive, person-centered, and equitable long-term care. To the extent possible, strategies should honor people’s preferences about care settings, enabling them to age within their home or community when possible. By 2027, countries should take first steps toward enacting strategies by implementing
|