Will Population Ageing Necessarily Lead to an Increase in the Number of Persons with Disabilities?

There is a widespread expectation that the combination of significant population ageing in Europe over the coming decades, along with the fact that the elderly are more likely to have disabilities, will result in a large increase in the total prevalence of disability and the need for significantly expanded care facilities for the elderly. Recent evidence from the U.S., however, suggests that disability rates of the elderly are declining and that further declines could be expected in the future. In this paper we present alternative demographic scenarios for the European Union (EU-15) that distinguish between people with and without disabilities by age and sex. The results show that under the assumption of a constant age-specific disability profile, we indeed expect a significant increase in the total number of people with disabilities due to population ageing. However, if the age profile of disability is shifted to the right (i.e., to higher ages) by one, two, or three years per decade, the scenarios show a much lower or no increase in the number of persons with disabilities in Europe over the coming decades.

Significance of life table estimates for small populations: Simulation-based study of estimation errors

We study bias, standard errors, and distributions of characteristics of life tables for small populations. Theoretical considerations and simulations show that statistical efficiency of different methods is, above all, affected by the population size. Yet it is also significantly affected by the life table construction method and by a population’s age composition. Study results are presented in the form of ready-to-use tables and relations, which may be useful in assessing the significance of estimates and differences in life expectancy across time and space for the territories with a small population size, when standard errors of life expectancy estimates may be high.errors, life table, small populations

Can Immigration Compensate for Europe's Low Fertility?

This paper addresses in a systematic demographic manner the widely discussed question: To what extent can immigration compensate for low fertility in Europe? We begin with a set of 28 alternative scenarios combining seven different fertility levels with four different migration assumptions at the level of the EU-15 to 2050. Next, we address the research question in the context of probabilistic population projections, and the new concept of conditional uncertainty distributions in population forecasting is introduced. Statistically this is done by sorting one thousand simulations into low, medium, and high groups for fertility and migration according to the average levels of paths over the simulation period. The results show a similar picture to that of the probability-free scenarios, but also indicate that for the old-age dependency ratio, the uncertainty about future mortality trends greatly adds to the ranges of the conditional uncertainty distributions.

Marriage in Russia: a reconstruction

The micro census 1994 of the Russian Federation collected detailed marital histories for al respondents. This information made it possible to construct multistate marital tables for both male and female cohorts born since 1910 for the first time. Continuity and change in marital patterns over a most turbulent of Russian history could be analyzed. Divorce rose monotonically from a quite low level for the cohort of 1910 to the high incidence that is characteristic for modern Russia. The typical Eastern European marriage pattern of early and almost universal marriage was remarkably stable. The major crisis, the Second World War, led to a postponement of marriage, but even in the female cohorts confronted with an extreme unbalanced marriage market the proportion never married was remarkably low.divorce, historical demography, marriage, multistate models, nuptiality, Russia, widowhood

Period Fertility in Russia since 1930

In this paper we present a detailed demographic analysis of the change of period fertility that occurred since 1930, based on individual retrospective data, collected in the most recent (five percent) microcensus of the Russian Federation from 1994. We assess the influence of external events on the level and distribution of (period) fertility. For the years prior to 1950 our information on age specific fertility is not complete, but using fertility models acceptable estimates can be constructed. The Coale-Trussell model is particularly suited for producing detailed and robust estimates of interpretable parameters of the fertility distribution. Although none of the observed crises in Russia succeeded in exerting a decisive influence on the course of the fertility transition, political events often had profound short-term effects.fertility, fertility models, historical demography, period fertility, Russia

A New Perspective on Population Ageing.

In Sanderson and Scherbov (2005) we introduced a new forwardlooking definition of age called “prospective age” and argued that its use, along with the traditional backward-looking concept of age, provides a more informative basis upon which to discuss population ageing. Age is a measure of how many years a person has already lived. Everyone of the same age has lived the same number of years. In contrast, prospective age is concerned about the future. Everyone with the same prospective age has the same expected remaining years of life. In this paper, we first explore the concept of prospective age in detail and show, using an analytic formulation, historical data, and forecasts, that prospective age is, in most cases, insensitive to whether it is measured using period or cohort life tables. We, then, use the two age concepts in concert and demonstrate how this enriches our understanding of population ageing in developed countries since 1960.

A new perspective on population aging

In Sanderson and Scherbov (2005) we introduced a new forward-looking definition of age and argued that its use, along with the traditional backward-looking concept of age, provides a more informative basis upon which to discuss population aging. Age is a measure of how many years a person has already lived. In contrast, our new approach to measuring age is concerned about the future. In this paper, we first explore our new age measure in detail and show, using an analytic formulation, historical data, and forecasts, that it is, in most cases, insensitive to whether it is measured using period or cohort life tables. We, then, show, using new forward-looking definitions of median age and the old age dependency ratio, how combining the traditional age concept and our new one enhances our understanding of population aging.age/aging, historical demography, life expectancy, median age, population forecasting, prospective age

'Vienna: a city beyond aging' - revisited and revised

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Future trends in the prevalence of severe activity limitations among older adults in Europe: a cross-national population study using EU-SILC

Objective: To project the proportion of population 65+ years with severe long-term activity limitations from 2017 to 2047. Design Large: population study. Setting: Population living in private households of the European Union (EU) and neighbouring countries. Participants: Participants from the EU Statistics on Income and Living Conditions aged 55 years and older and living in one of 26 EU and neighbouring countries, who answered the health section of the questionnaire. Outcome measures: Prevalence of severe long-term activity limitations of particular subpopulations (ie, 55+, 65+, 75+ and 85+ years) by sex and country. Results: We find a huge variation in the prevalence of self-reported severe long-term limitations across Europe for both sexes. However, in 2017, about 20% of the female population aged 65 years and above and about 16% of their male counterparts are expected to report severe long-term activity limitations after accounting for differences in reporting. Accounting for cultural differences in reporting, we expect that European countries will have about 21% (decile 1: 19.5%; decile 9: 22.9%) of female and about 16.8% (decile 1: 15.4%; decile 9: 18.1%) of male 65+ years population with severe long-term activity limitations by 2047. Conclusions: Overall, despite the expected increase of life expectancy in European countries, our results suggest almost constant shares of older adults with severe long-term activity limitations within the next 30 years

Assessing the potential impact of COVID-19 on life expectancy

BACKGROUND: The COVID-19 virus pandemic has caused a significant number of deaths worldwide. If the prevalence of the infection continues to grow, this could impact life expectancy. This paper provides first estimates of the potential direct impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on period life expectancy. METHODS: From the estimates of bias-adjusted age-specific infection fatality rates in Hubei (China) and a range of six prevalence rate assumptions ranging from 1% to 70%, we built a discrete-time microsimulation model that simulates the number of people infected by COVID-19, the number dying from it, and the number of deaths from all causes week by week for a period of one year. We applied our simulation to four broad regions: North America and Europe; Latin America and the Caribbean; Southeastern Asia; and sub-Saharan African. For each region, 100,000 individuals per each 5-year age group are simulated. RESULTS: At a 10% COVID-19 prevalence rate, the loss in life expectancy at birth is likely above 1 year in North America and Europe and in Latin America and the Caribbean. In Southeastern Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, one year lost in life expectancy corresponds to an infection prevalence of about 15% and 25%, respectively. Given the uncertainty in fatality rates, with a 50% prevalence of COVID-19 infections under 95% prediction intervals, life expectancy would drop by 3 to 9 years in North America and Europe, by 3 to 8 years in Latin America and the Caribbean, by 2 to 7 years in Southeastern Asia, and by 1 to 4 years in sub-Saharan Africa. In all prevalence scenarios, as long as the COVID-19 infection prevalence rate remains below 1 or 2%, COVID-19 would not affect life expectancy in a substantial manner. INTERPRETATION: In regions with relatively high life expectancy, if the infection prevalence threshold exceeds 1 or 2%, the COVID-19 pandemic will break the secular trend of increasing life expectancy, resulting in a decline in period life expectancy. With life expectancy being a key indicator of human development, mortality increase, especially among the vulnerable subgroups of populations, would set a country back on its path of human development