NEWS

AARP Spotlights Age-Friendly Communities and Equity

Feb 10, 2021

Local leaders from across the country are demonstrating how equity approaches can be advanced and accelerated through their age-friendly work. AARP’s Livable Communities team has created a webpage, announced in their recent newsletter, that highlights some national examples.

Locally, the Massachusetts Healthy Aging Collaborative (MHAC) has worked with partners to build on the “eight domains” included in the age-friendly framework to ultimately create a new model. This amended framework reflects the state’s strong Dementia Friendly initiative, but also calls out access, equity and inclusion as a specific domain communities are encouraged to address and embed throughout their work.

To help communities carry this out in practice, MHAC created the Healthy Aging for All Guide, which includes resources and tools that age-and dementia-friendly community stakeholders can use to promote conversations and take action to reduce inequities.

MHAC is also promoting a report supported by the Tufts Health Plan Foundation and conducted by FSG that analyzed innovative community responses to COVID-19 that support healthy aging. The report includes several examples and resources that can help communities promote equity and inclusion.