International and national geriatric demographics

Launched in 2009, ANCIEN is a research project financed under the 7th EU Research Framework Programme. It ran for a 44-month period and involved 20 partners from EU member states. This project principally concerns the future of long-term care for the elderly in Europe.

Based on this research, the population projections forecast that in the next 30 years, the largest population growth will be among the population aged 65 and older. At approximately 5%, Sweden has the highest proportion of the elderly aged over 80 in Europe. In 2060, this number is expected to double to 10% of the population. Although the population in Sweden is increasing, population ageing will have a negative impact on the old-age dependency ratio, putting pressure on the population of working age to support an increasing number of elderly persons. The old-age dependency ratio, measured as the ratio between the population over age 65 and the population of working age, is estimated to grow as high as 47% in 2060, which is a growth rate of over 20% from the 26% old-age dependency ratio in 2007.

 – (Swedish Association of Local Authorities and Regions, 2008).

The percentage of the South African population aged 60 years and above rose from 7,1% in 1996 to 8,0% in 2011, constituting an increase from 2,8 million to 4,1 million individuals. This is one of the findings contained in the Profile of Older Persons in South Africa report. The report, which is based on the three population censuses of 1996, 2001 and 2011, provides valuable information on the demographic and socio-economic profiles of the elderly population.