Aging and Health in China

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Background

China is aging rapidly. The number of older people aged 65 and above increased from 49 million (4.91 percent of the total population) in 1982, 119 million (8.92 percent) in 2010, to 176 million (12.60 percent) in 2019. China is and will be holding the largest population of old age in the foreseeable future. One main implication from this large group of older people is that the population health of China will be more featured by chronic diseases and disability. According to China’s 2010 census data, among those aged 60 and above, 13.90 percent were not healthy though they had independence in activities of daily living (ADL), and 2.9 percent lost their independence. It is estimated that during the remaining life expectancy of 16.1 years for people aged 65 in China, there are 4.7 years with disability in the instrumental activity of daily living, and 2.8 years with difficulty in the activity of daily living. Older people’s health has thus become a challenging issue in China, provided China’s underdeveloped social and medical security system and the dramatic socio-demographic transition.

In recent years, there have been several large ongoing surveys on older people in China. Those surveys include the Chinese Longitudinal Healthy Longevity Survey (CLHLS), China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study (CHARLS), China Longitudinal Aging Social Survey (CLASS), Well-being of Elderly in Anhui Province, China, and China Health and Nutrition Survey (CHNS), which has facilitated the research on aging and health in China.

For the proposed Research Topic, we would like to invite scholars worldwide to contribute to aging and health in China, based on the above and other data sources. We expect this Research Topic will add greatly to the literature with diverse themes, including the status quo of population aging in China, affecting factors of older people’s health, health inequality, and public policies to improve older people’s health.

Our goal is to collect cutting-edge research in the field of aging and health in China. Through this Research Topic, we hope to better understand the current status of population aging in China, to compare China with the rest of the world in regard to the established gerontological knowledge, and to further explore the factors influencing health in older adults and policy interventions in China in order to further contribute to global healthy aging.

To achieve these goals, we encourage submissions that are broadly related, but not limited to the following themes to expand current knowledge on aging and health in China. We welcome Original Research papers (including meta-analyses), Perspectives, as well as Review articles. We also expect submissions from the interdisciplinary perspective.
• Health and social service in disadvantaged groups of old age (e.g., older adults who are unmarried, widowed, disabled, and have lost their only child);
• Social security of old age in China;
• Factors and mechanisms of health in older adults;
• Marriage, Family, and health in old age;
• Older adults in institutions;
• Social participation, social adaption, and older people’s health;
• Environments and health in the elderly;
• Health inequality among older people.

Important note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.

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