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Old age in front of the mirror in times of covid-19

2020-06-08T13:06:19.347Z


This is not just about coronaviruses, but about the uncertainty about our final years, a doubt that has arisen for all of us in this pandemic


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The passage of time and its effects on people are issues that are part of the mysteries of life, especially in these times where youth is overvalued. The search for theories that could explain it goes back to ancient times. What is clear today is that being an older person is being part of a group that exempts itself from any possibility of characterization because diversity is the norm. Delineating and defining when one is older, either personally or collectively and with all functional states (physiological, cognitive, social and sexual identity), is a task that lacks a single answer.

Aging and the passing of time is something that defies all logic. A study by the American Pew Research Center that analyzed 3,000 people showed that 65% of those who reach the age of 60 feel young at that age. This means that one's perceptions play a fundamental role. That same study also concluded that those who are under 30 years old think that old age begins at 60, but those who were in middle age indicated this beginning at 70. On the other hand, those who were at 65, or something else, they considered the beginning of old age at 74 years. In these perceptions, gender is something that also influences. Women noted that one begins to get "old" at 70, while that magic number for men stood at 66.

In Spain, a study by the Center for Sociological Research asked: At what age do you think someone is an older person? Those who were between 20 and 29 answered that at 67 years old. The latest start was expressed by those who had passed the 80s who answered that old age began at 70. It is curious because there are also differences depending on the country in which we ask this question.

The study Predictions on age throughout Europe in 2011, determined that in Turkey the beginning of old age occurs at 55 years, in Spain and Sweden at 62 and for the Greeks, at 68 years. It occurred to me to ask this same question to my second year students of the Medicine career at the National University of Mar del Plata, there are usually more than 300 students per year, and in 2018 their answer was 67.

The situation of the pandemic has focused on something that already existed and it is the lack of attention and the stereotypes that haunt and affect the lives of older people. Something that, on the other hand, is the best thing that could happen to us as people and as a country. Longevity is not only a personal triumph, but a measure of social development for all.

The confinement that we have been living for weeks has forced us to have a reunion with ourselves. The confinement confronts us with our most intimate and personal emotions. And it should be an experience that allows us to think about our old man or old woman inside and in that uncertain future before a situation that is beyond our control and that the majority of people, also the elderly, of today never imagined. This is not just about coronaviruses, but about the uncertainty about our final years. The pandemic has shown us brutally, although some of us are not older people, at least for now.

* Diego Bernardini is a full professor of Medicine at the National University of Mar del Plata, Argentina.

Source: elparis

All news articles on 2020-06-08

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