The World Health Organization's impacts on age‐friendly policymaking: A case study on Australia

Abstract

This paper reflects on whether and how the World Health Organization (WHO) inspires age‐friendly policymaking across different levels of government. This is done via a case study in which we analyse the policies of Australia's three‐tiered federated government system against the WHO's eight core age‐friendly cities domains. Findings suggest that membership of the Global Network of Age‐Friendly Cities and Communities did not appear to overtly inspire the development of age‐friendly policies across Australian governments. Content analysis shows there is an overwhelming policy focus on care and support services, with little attention to cultural diversity. This reflects an outdated portrayal of debilitation in later life and a lack of recognition of how diverse circumstances impact the ageing process and corresponding support needs. Our findings also reveal the challenges of a three‐tiered federated system, where varying financial and authoritative capacities have influenced how different governments acknowledge and respond to population ageing. Notably, local governments—the main level of implementation targeted by the WHO—are invariably constrained in developing their own age‐friendly policies and may opt to adopt those of higher levels of government instead. These challenges will likely impact other resource‐limited governments in responding to the needs of their emerging ageing populations.

Age-Friendly environment: A systematic literature review

“…Phase 1 is about research questions (RQ). They are organized around four areas: (a) Quartile or Sinta levels of journals (RQ1), documentary characteristics geographical location (RQ2), and research methodologies used (RQ3); (b) domain and dimension of an age-friendly environment identified in the literature (RQ4) [1,3]; (c) the factors that contribute to successful implementation (RQ5) [9]; and (d) the outcomes (RQ6) [10] and impacts (RQ7) [11] of age-friendly environment initiatives in the analyzed studies.…”

“…As a systematic literature review, this study found the age-friendly environment concept is still in emerging studies. The basic foundation of the concept which come from WHO Europe office [11] is going to implement in other studies about environment and city [1], health, well-being, and social impact [10,15], policy [3,16], and community [9]. The recent studies about age-friendly environment concept also proposed inclusive model in vulnerable areas [17], social participation [18] and sustainable development goals [19].…”

“…Indonesia was one of many states around the world that has adopted the framework the age-friendly framework. Indonesia also developed programs and initiatives to create more age-friendly environments [3].…”

Poverty and Australian housing: findings from an Investigative Panel

“…While the NDIS and the My Aged Care program can recommend and co-fund home modifications as part of their respective support assessments, many barriers exist to prevent them from being put into practice. Different levels of external approvals-from housing providers and/or owners' corporations in strata-titled properties-may be required in order to implement modifications (Liu, Atkins et al 2022). There is also evidence that older properties may be structurally unable to support modifications due to poor initial construction and/or lack of maintenance.…”