Scenarios in a demographic counter ageing society

Raimondo Cagiano de Azevedo, Università di Roma "La Sapienza"
Cinzia Castagnaro, Instituto Nazionale di Statistica (ISTAT)

The experience of demographic ageing produces in Europe the approach of the average age at death to the maximum age compatible with the current biological watch. That shows a double effect of compression and expansion of the life span. Expansion due to the increase in the number of persons still alive at the old age; and compression due to the same increase in the years spent in life by the whole population. If the median age of a population, in twenty years, moves approximately from 35 to 55 years, this means that twenty generations of adult pass, in the same period, from the older to the younger part of the population. This is taking place in all the European countries and expresses the image of a counter ageing: a biological rejuvenation associate to a demographic ageing. New definitions, policies and alternative scenarios are requested and suggested for a different life-cycle.