OVERVIEW: LIFE LONG JUSTICE

PROBLEMS, RESPONSES & NEXT STEPS

THE PROBLEM

Elder abuse can take many forms: physical, sexual and psychological abuse, neglect by paid and unpaid caregivers, financial exploitation, and wrongful deprivation of rights. Victims often suffer more than one type of mistreatment, and there is emerging evidence that one type of mistreatment puts elders at risk of being additionally victimized.  Perpetrators may be individuals (family and non-family members), groups, or organizations.

Millions of people – victims themselves and those who care about them – suffer as a result of elder abuse every year. Given the aging population, dementia on the rise, unrecognized and unaddressed mental health issues, and caregiver shortages, increasing numbers of people are at risk for elder abuse. A recent study found that almost 50% of people with dementia cared for by a family caregiver are abused.  The problem cuts across all demographic and geographic borders, and occurs in all settings – homes, community settings, and facilities. The 5 million people with dementia and those 85 and older (the fastest growing segment of the population) are at greatest risk. Yet, most cases (80 – 90%) are never reported and there is little research to help those on the front lines to detect the problem or inform how they respond.  Similarly, there’s virtually no evaluation of ongoing programs to tell us whether they work or data to inform the efforts of policy and law makers.  What we do know is that the human and economic costs of elder abuse are vast, leading to a 300% increase in premature death, untold suffering, and countless billions in losses for individuals, families and public programs.

RESPONSES

Experts estimate that our awareness about elder abuse lags some 40 years behind child abuse and 20 years behind domestic violence.  The federal legislative landscape leaves much work to be done: The recently-enacted Elder Justice Act has not yet been funded and important provisions of the original law were not enacted. Similarly, most elder justice provisions in the Older Americans Act (2006) have never been funded or implemented. And the elder abuse provision in the Violence Against Women Act, although among the smallest of VAWA’s programs, is one of the largest sources of funding in the elder justice field.    In short, elder abuse remains a largely unrecognized among human rights, social justice, health care reform, or law reform issue. Elder justice efforts receive a fraction of the resources that go to comparable issues for front line services, research, policy-development, awareness-raising, or training. And most elder abuse victims can not advocate on their own behalf due to death or incapacity, so are entirely dependant on the efforts of others to address their plight.    Advocates for related issues (such as Alzheimer’s, domestic violence, child abuse or victim assistance) raise millions for their causes and can unleash torrents of calls, emails and postcards in hours. They have powerful allies, sophisticated messages, broad grassroots and grasstops networks, and take a strategic approach to communications, legislation, policy, research, legal action, direct services, planning and fund raising. No similar infrastructure exists in the elder justice field.     Resources devoted to the most vulnerable and abused elders by federal, philanthropic, corporate, or individual funders represent only a tiny fraction of those devoted to comparable issues. These deficits have kept elder abuse in the shadows of human rights and social justice issues.     Appleseed’s Life Long Justice initiative seeks to address these deficits, by taking a strategic approach to advocacy.

NEXT STEPS

The elder abuse field is comprised of numerous issues, disciplines and organizations. A group of key experts and leaders in the field believes that it is vital to develop advocacy that can provide effective strategic leadership across the field’s many issues, disciplines and organizations. As such, Life Long Justice seeks, in the short term, to (1) strengthen networks and alliances among the diverse stakeholders and groups relating to key issues, (2) foster and facilitate critical conversations regarding the federal legislative landscape, and identify short and long term substantive and strategic priorities for the field; grounded in data and expertise; (3) guide and collaborate on legal advocacy projects pursued by pro bono partners; and (4) develop a strategic plan and operating model grounded in vision and outcomes, and a fund- raising plan commensurate with those goals.   Ongoing goals with a longer trajectory include (1) developing a message and communications strategy to effectively raise awareness about the issue, (2) creating a political constituency, (3) raising awareness among potential funders, (4) promoting research and development of the knowledge base, and (5) beginning to rally grassroots and grasstops support and engagement.    Several factors make this an ideal time for this effort. New leadership at the Departments of Health and Human Services and Justice is showing new interest in and commitment to elder justice issues. Formation of the national Elder Justice Advisory Board and federal Coordinating Council mandated by the EJA is underway. The Older Americans Act and the Violence Against Women Act (both of which contain elder justice provisions) are scheduled for reauthorization in 2011. And other elder justice-related laws are pending or being contemplated. There is increasing coverage of elder abuse in the media. And leaders in the field, mindful that the problem is growing as the world ages, have coalesced to support the advocacy efforts of Appleseed’s Life Long Justice, to work collaboratively to assure advocacy informed by data, expertise and vision, on the complex constellation of problems encompassed by elder abuse.    In short, elder justice is a vital social justice and human rights issue whose time has come.