IFA 2021 Conference. Rights Matter – First Reflections.

The overall theme title was Rights Matter – where we were asked “as a global community to stand up for older person’s rights and treat them with the dignity and respect they deserve.” Considering this theme was set before the global pandemic, it certainly turned out to be even more poignant.

Maybe the fact that the date of this conference was postponed twice, in consideration of the ongoing uncertainties of the pandemic, added to the long anticipation for what the tone of the conference dialogue might be, given some of the disturbing experiences that befell older people, for example in long term care and other congregate settings.

Sobering enough. But even more, as I attended the conference (on the virtual platform), the discussion about the rights of older people played in my head while at the same time the COP26 climate change summit rolled out like a slow, sad lament, and many scenes of human mass migration displayed nightly on the daily news feeds.

All these realities are interconnected and wrap into the theme of Rights Matter – and in his opening comments, Graeme Prior, President of the International Federation on Ageing (IFA) touched a nerve as he spoke of how, at the beginning of this UN Decade of Healthy Ageing, 2021 in way serves as a marker, like 911 did in 2001, as the year that worldwide health security affects all of us as we age through our life course.

Embedded in this Rights Matter theme at this conference was also a call to action around a campaign for a UN convention on the rights of older persons which builds from the UN Open-Ended Working Group on Ageing (OEWG) in progress which, in addition to the IFA, is endorsed by other entities such as the Global Alliance for the Rights of Older People (GAROP) – HelpAge international and the International Longevity Centre Canada.

As for the selection of topics in the breakout sessions, there were several that carried the Rights Matter theme, directly and indirectly. As with the Toronto 2018 IFA conference I attended in person, there was more than enough varied content to choose from, and I had no disappointment with the sessions I participated in, though due to technical sound issues, I did switch out of one room to another, which is a lot easier and less conspicuous to do on a virtual platform.

In my next post I will highlight two breakout sessions that stood out for me; and not to end here on too sombre a note, I will say that there were positive examples of how communities in other countries are redesigning and redirecting efforts to improve health and social care systems (and more) that will hopefully close the gap on inequities and benefit future generations of older persons.