ABSTRACT
The pervading trend of global consumerism threatens the positive concept of durability by emphasizing the hazards of antiquity. The perception of aging by modern society is affected by this trend. Western cultures propagate the impression that the aging process is merely the descent along a gradual slope that inevitably leads to death. Viewed in this manner, it is not surprising that depression is erroneously considered a natural reaction to the aging process. Available evidence indicates that this bias exists even among health-care professionals.1 Such attitudes pose obstacles to the provision of adequate, well-coordinated care to a segment of the population at risk from a life-threatening disease.
