Growing Older
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Today more and more people are living longer. Cleaner living
conditions, vaccinations and better nutrition help prevent many
diseases and modern medicines cure others.
But longer life has also brought difficulties. First, older people
tend to have more health problems than younger people.
Although most of these problems are not caused by age
itself, the changes age makes in a person’s body can make the
problems more serious or difficult to treat.
Second, as the world changes and younger family members
move away from their communities to earn a living, many older
people are left to care for themselves. Or, if they do live with
their children, older people may feel like a burden in a family or
community that no longer values and respects age.
Older women are more likely to face these problems than
older men, because women usually live longer and often reach
old age without a partner. So in this chapter we describe how
older women can take care of their health, treat common health
problems of aging, and work to improve the difficult conditions
under which many older women live.
➤ Everyone is the
age of their heart.
—Guatemalan
proverb
Where Women Have No Doctor 2012