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A National Post-Pandemic Resilience Programme: Supporting older adults to recover from the pandemic

Source: The Physiological Society / Centre for Ageing Better - Dec 2021

National-Post-Pandemic-Resilience-Programme_Dec 2021.pdf

 

The COVID-19 pandemic has taken a huge toll on lives and livelihoods in the UK and across the world. In addition to the direct consequences through lives lost and debilitating effects of Long COVID, the pandemic and lockdowns will have longterm effects on an array of public health issues. While the Omicron variant may yet require additional restrictions to be reintroduced, it is more important than ever that we plan for a post-pandemic world and its consequences on physical activity.

We are concerned about the impact of the pandemic on physical activity levels among older people, particularly given people with lower levels of habitual physical activity were more severely affected by the disease. Regular physical activity is also vital to maintaining health and resilience. In October 2020 we commissioned the polling company YouGov to survey older adults on how the pandemic and lockdown was affecting them. As the UK emerges from the COVID-19 pandemic, we have asked YouGov to again survey older people to give us an indication of what the longterm impact may be.
It is clear from our new survey that the pandemic has had a detrimental impact on physical activity levels: despite restrictions now being lifted, over a quarter of over-50s told us they are less physically active than pre-pandemic. Given the role of physical activity in maintaining health, this is a cause for real concern and it is likely that general health will have diminished as a direct consequence.

It follows a pattern of recent research. For example, Age UK’s report from May 2021 that found that 1 in 4 older people’s ability to do everyday activities has worsened during the pandemic.1
Reductions in physical activity among all age groups will result in negative health implications, but this is particularly concerning for older and frail adults who are already at increased risk from low physical activity levels. Following the lifting of most restrictions in the UK, it is clear to us that we will have an impending physical resilience crisis affecting many older adults, driven by a reduction in physical activity. The top two reasons cited in our most recent data for a reduction in activity are a lack of motivation and that people are out of the habit of exercising or undertaking activities in person. We therefore need a big, bold programme to motivate and encourage older adults to get moving. This is also important as cases of ‘Long COVID’, where physical activity levels and resilience will be low, continue to grow.

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