HEALTH4ALL
Caring for the elderly
- Published: 14/02/2012 at 04:27 AM
- Newspaper section: Life
More than half of my heart patients are above the age of 65. This doesn't come as a surprise since heart diseases usually come with advancing years; the older you are, the higher the risk. But in the not-too-distant future I expect that most of my patients will be 75, or older, because people are now living longer and this increased longevity means that our society contains a greater proportion of elderly citizens.
Life expectancy is now higher than ever before. The average life span of a Thai person back in 1997 was about 70 years; that figure rose to almost 80 in 2005.
In the US, senior citizens (65 and older) now make up 12% of the population and statisticians have estimated that by 2030 there will be over 70 million elderly people worldwide. In Thailand, the number of people aged between 60 and 79 is about 6.2 million, and in excess of 755,000 people are above the age of 80. So, 11% of Thailand's population is now older than 60.
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About the author
- Writer: Dr Nithi Mahanonda
- Position: Writer
