Age-friendly environments in Europe: a handbook of domains for policy action

Overview

Policies to create better age-friendly environments have become a forceful movement in Europe and globally in which a growing number of cities and communities, local authorities and regional governments participate. This publication provides a handbook for local policy-makers and planners on eight domains for policy action. These cover both the physical and social environment as well as community services. It builds on a WHO model of eight domains for age-friendly cities and communities that is widely used by local governments in Europe as point of reference. This handbook is based on lessons learned from existing age-friendly initiatives in Europe. It thus builds on the richness of relevant locally and regionally developed tools that are now available, as well as the latest evidence from research. This publication links actions to create more age-friendly environments to the broader context of European health and social policies for ageing populations. A focus is on the inter-connectedness and mutual synergies between the eight domains and how they can work together to address common goals such as increasing social inclusion, fostering physical activity or supporting people living with dementia.