Geneva: India stands a dismal 73rd in the list of 91 countries,
according to a UN-backed study on the wellbeing of the elderly in a
rapidly ageing world.
Global AgeWatch Index 2013 released the
rankings, based on data from the World Health Organisation and other
agencies on older people's incomes, health, education, employment and
their environments.
Sweden is the best place to grow old and
Afghanistan the worst, according to the study that warns many countries
are ill-prepared to deal with the old age time bomb.
In a rapidly greying world, the Global AgeWatch Index - the
first of its kind - found that Sweden, known for its generous welfare
state, followed by Norway and Germany were best equipped to deal with
the challenges of an ageing population.
How countries care for
their senior citizens will become increasingly important as the number
of people over the age of 60 is set to soar from some 809 million today
to more than two billion by 2050 - when they will account for more than
one in five people on the planet, the report said.
"The 21st
century is seeing an unprecedented global demographic transition, with
population ageing at its heart," the authors of the study said.
The
survey ranked many African and South Asian countries as the worst
places to be retired, with Tanzania, Pakistan and Afghanistan rounding
out the bottom three.
The index was compiled by the HelpAge
International advocacy group and the UN Population Fund in a bid to
provide much-needed data on ageing populations worldwide.
Praise for Bolivia, Sri LankaIt
ranked the social and economic wellbeing of the elderly in 91
countries, by comparing data from the World Health Organisation and
other global agencies on older people's incomes, health, education,
employment and their environments.
While the world's richest
countries - including Western European nations, the US and Japan -
predictably ranked highly, the report somewhat surprisingly found that a
number of lower-income countries had put in place policies that
significantly improved the quality of life for their elderly.
Bolivia,
which offers free healthcare to its older citizens despite being one of
the poorest surveyed countries, and Sri Lanka, with its long-term
investments in health and education, were among those singled out for
praise.
HelpAge's chief executive Silvia Stefanoni said a lack of
urgency in the debate about older people's wellbeing "is one of the
biggest obstacles to meeting the needs of the world's ageing
population".
"By giving us a better understanding of the quality
of life of women and men as they age, this new index can help us focus
our attention on where things are going well and where we have to make
improvements," she said in a statement.
The study also noted that
some of the top-ranking countries had introduced successful policies to
care for the elderly at a time when they were still emerging economies.
Sweden
for instance put in place its universal pension system a century ago,
while Norway introduced its system in 1937, it said.
"Limited resources need not be a barrier to countries providing for their older citizens," the report said.
The
emerging economies of Brazil and China ranked 31st and 35th in the
survey, while South Africa, India and Russia came in much lower at 65,
73 and 78 respectively.
On a positive note, the survey found that
some countries and regions that were ageing the fastest were already
preparing for the democratic shift.
Latin American countries,
which face a doubling of their elderly populations by 2050, are well
represented among the top 30, the index showed, with Chile and Uruguay
in 19th and 23rd place.
But some eastern European countries still
have much work to do, it showed, with Moldova ranking 76th and
Montenegro at 83rd place.
