Discrimination Against Older People Pervasive Worldwide

Ageism – the stereotyping, prejudice and/or discrimination of individuals or groups on the basis of their age - is all around us. One just has to look at a rack of birthday cards for images ridiculing older people or the rows of ‘anti-ageing’ creams on the shelves of your local pharmacy. Harmless, one may think, but it doesn’t stop there. In a new report on ageism and age discrimination, the UN Independent Expert on the rights of older people, Claudia Mahler, says that ageism is so pervasive that discrimination, marginalization, and exclusion of older people is the norm. The report substantiates what a March 2021 WHO report had already revealed: that one in two people globally have ageist attitudes about older people.