REMARKS BY PRESIDENT McALEESE AT THE PUBLIC STUDY AND HEALTH ASSESSMENT CLINIC FOR TILDA
REMARKS BY PRESIDENT McALEESE AT THE PUBLIC STUDY AND HEALTH ASSESSMENT CLINIC FOR THE IRISH LONGITUDINAL STUDY OF AGEING
Dia dhibh go leir. Tá an-áthas orm bheith anseo libh inniu agus muid ag céiliúradh an ócáid mor seo.
Good afternoon everyone, many thanks for your warm welcome and to Trinity College for the invitation to officially open the Public Study and Health Assessment Clinic for the Irish Longitudinal study of ageing or TILDA for short.
Earlier today I attended the 1916 Commemoration Ceremony in Arbour Hill. It was, as it always is, a moving event marking a journey now 93 years on and those who were the human catalysts for that journey. There have been so many Irelands in the intervening years, so many twists and turns that shifted the narrative and changed the challenges that faced each new generation. There has been a huge transformation in terms of quality of life and length of life in the interim, changes that should never be taken for granted. What was then, in many respects, a third world country has become a first world country. A place of relentless grinding poverty, disease, infant mortality and low life expectancy has become another country entirely for the grandchildren and great grandchildren of the era of a Proclamation which pledged to create a Republic that would cherish the children of the nation equally. The scholarly research around which we gather today will help introduce us to that changed and still-changing Ireland through the prism of an ageing population. The multi-year study researching the quality of life of a representative sample of 8,000 people aged over 50, will slice down through Irish life in ways that take us beyond anecdote or myth, into the lived experience of those who are approaching the centenary of the Rising.
Internationally, there have been more gains in life expectancy in the last 50 years than in the previous 5000. It is a generally heartening piece of news, particularly if, like me, you are on the wrong side of fifty, but it does change things. Subjects like pensions and healthcare take on a different set of statistics with considerable downstream implications for policy and planning. The promotion of good quality of extended active life and of the things which conduce to successful ageing move up the priority list.
Abraham Lincoln once said “If we could first know where we are and whither we are tending, we could better judge what to do and how to do it”. We are fortunate to have time now to plan for the future, because in comparative terms our population is still young. But to develop realistic and effective policies we need to hear in a coherent way from those whose story this is. To use the old Irish phrase, “Ag duine féin is fearr a fhios cá luíonn an bhrog air”, “the wearer is best placed to know where the shoe pinches them.” It was salutary back in 2007 to hear the views of older men at a Forum we held at the Áras on the isolation many of them live with, especially in rural areas.
The Irish Longitudinal Study on Ageing, TILDA, the first of its kind in Ireland, is designed to collect information from men and women aged fifty years and over, on a periodic and ongoing basis, on all aspects of their lives from their physical and mental health, their service use and needs, their economic status and their participation in society. The research team is cross-disciplinary and cross-institutional in nature ensuring the broadest and deepest probing of the important nooks and crannies of our lived lives. Putting such a team together and sustaining is in not an easy task but the integrity of its purpose is outstanding and so it has been able to garner experts from TCD itself, the Institutes of Technology at Dundalk and Waterford, NUIG, UCC, UCD, the RCSI, and the ESRI, Government Departments and the Office for Older People and international collaborators. These collaborations ensure as rounded a national picture as possible, the placing of it in its appropriate international context, the sharing of national and international insight and experience and the establishment of a sure-footed platform for future planning.
The TILDA Consortium and Study team under the leadership of Principal Investigator, Prof. Roseanne Kenny and Project Director, Prof. Brendan Whelan deserve huge thanks for making it their mission to help improve the quality of life of older people by bringing research on ageing to a new level of penetration and insight. In these very chastening times for our country, the wisdom, experience, and resilience of our older generation, themselves veterans of several recessions, will have a critical contribution to make to the national journey of recovery. This study will undoubtedly enhance their capacity to make that contribution and many, many more. I mentioned at the outset our ambition to be a republic that cherishes its children equally - we could add to that ‘from cradle to grave’. We want this, to contradict W.B. Yeats, to be a country for old men and old women, where they can relish a full and fulfilling life no matter how many miles are on the clock.
As we launch the study and the TILDA Health Assessment Clinic which will be its engine, I wish all those involved every success. I hope the opening and associated events including Richard Suzman’s lecture tomorrow will galvanise public interest and inspire us to work for an Ireland which truly actively cherishes its young at heart.
Go raibh maith agat agus bail o dhia ar an obair.