ABSTRACT

The purpose of this concluding chapter is to review some of the major issues that have been highlighted by the various authors in the book. A major underlying theme, identified in Chapter 1 and pursued in many subsequent chapters, is that there is not a simple, one-way correlation between ‘greater development’ and ‘better health’. While to some extent this is a matter of the definition of the two concepts, both largely unquantifiable and each with a subjective element, it is nevertheless increasingly clear that development improvements often equate with different health and not simply better health. In the majority of countries with higher and increasing real incomes per capita, there is often (but not invariably) a longer average expectation of life, but this longer life may have attendant health problems. It can also have differing social care problems related to family and community care, the availability of pensions and social support and appropriate accommodation. These are, it is true, emerging as issues in many middle-income countries, but there is often a degree of family support that continues to encompass older people in less developed economies.