From Silver to Gold

This commentary explores the positive vision of aging highlighted at the Business of Aging Innovation Summit held at the MaRS Centre in Toronto.  No one can deny the aches, pains and suffering typically associated with advancing age.  But diagnostic and preventive interventions − along with lifelong opportunities for learning, employment and social engagement − can push back the onset of age-based incapacity.  Emerging research on brain fitness demonstrated how new scanning technologies can identify chronic brain disease at least ten years before symptoms of debilitating conditions, such as dementia, actually appear.  Information and communication technologies have opened up worlds of opportunity − not just for an older population but for all.  There is a vast untapped market worth an estimated $20 billion by 2020.  Finally, the vision of healthy aging presented at the Summit requires more flexible employment and pension policies.  Aging has finally come of age.

ISBN – 1-55382-429-6