'Confront ageism': Saskatoon campaign seeks to change attitudes toward aging

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'Confront ageism': Saskatoon campaign seeks to change attitudes toward aging

The Saskatoon Council on Aging has launched a new campaign called "Confront Ageism: It Starts With You," aiming to increase awareness of ageism.

Ageism, as defined by the World Health Organization (WHO), refers to how we think, feel and act toward others or even ourselves based on age.

Campaign chair and associate professor at the University of Saskatchewan College of Medicine, Dr. Brittany Ellis, said the pervasive nature of ageism impacts older people in many ways.

"It affects their health, their physical health, their mental health, the causes isolation, loneliness," she said.

The first thing is really just recognizing that ageism exists,” Ellis said.

Ellis said a stark example of ageism was obvious at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, where older people were blamed for the spread of coronavirus and had their autonomy taken away.

"We saw older people being blamed for the spread of COVID. We saw older people having their autonomy, their independence completely taken away," she said.

“You can't change something if you don't even recognize it. So knowing what ageism is seeing it around you being able to identify it.”

Ellis said ageism is often overlooked compared to other forms of discrimination, something she said needs to change.