Preparations to Stay Hale and Hearty in Your Old Age / 日本農村医学会雑誌

ABSTRACT

The author founded the “Society of the New Elderly” in 2000 and launched a campaign to redefine old age. It was some 50 years back that the elderly were defined as those people over the age of 65 in industrially advanced countries.However, with the average life expectancy of Japanese at birth topping 82, the author suggested five years ago that the elderly should refer to those people 70 and over. The Society adopted the following four slogans:(1) to love, (2) to initiate, (3) to endure, and (4) to promote world peace by letting school children learn how peace could be realized through the stories of the horrors of war told by the aged who experienced them during World War II.It was emphasized that good models of the elderly should be shown to the young generation through hearty communication at their homes or at public places.The author recently visited Dr. Schweitzer's hospital at Lambarene in Gabon and learned how the Alsatian medical missionary had dedicated himself to the people there to let them know how precious the life of humans and all other living things, because they were created by God.Finally, the author mentioned the latest research we had been conducting with the participation of volunteers among the memebers of the Society. Through the cohort study, it is to investigate how their genus are influenced by their lifestyle.The author has been trying to persuade health professionals in different disciplines into working together more closely in order to improve the quality of health care.