(Garrison, NY)  Against the backdrop of federal budget negotiations bearing on the future of Medicare and Social Security are ongoing concerns about an aging population: health, economic well-being, family needs, and values about illness and inevitable mortality. To give voice to these concerns and seek viable solutions, The Hastings Center launched Over 65, a blog by and for those in the Medicare population.Over 65 was created by leaders in medicine who are well over 65 and have worked on issues about aging and end-of-life care for much of their careers: Daniel Callahan, cofounder of The Hastings Center; James Sabin, a psychiatrist and clinical professor of population medicine and of psychiatry at Harvard; and Sherwin Nuland, a professor emeritus of surgery at Yale and bestselling author.

In addition, Over 65 has dozens of supporters who are leaders in medicine, health policy, and other areas, many of whom are also contributors. They include David Baltimore, Nobel laureate and president emeritus of California Institute of Technology; Derek Bok, president emeritus of Harvard; Sissela Bok, a senior visiting fellow at the Harvard Center for Population and Development Studies; Theodore Marmor, professor emeritus of political science at the Yale School of Management; Steven Schroeder, president emeritus of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation; and two MacArthur Award Fellows – Carol Levine, director of the Families and Health Project of the New York Hospital Fund, and Diane Meier, director of the Center for Palliative Care at Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York.

Over 65 posts are a mix of personal narratives and commentaries on health and economic policies concerning seniors. Recent posts include “Mommy’s Long Life with Alzheimer’s Disease,” which explores what happens when a 99-year-old with advanced Alzheimer’s disease outlives her six-month prognosis by two years; “Do We Need Less Technology, or More?” a geriatrician’s look at the ways that technological innovation can harm and help seniors and their families; and “I’m Over 65 and Counting the Money,” about the economic worries of a recently retired physician who thought he was an expert on health insurance (he’d written a book) until he signed up for Medicare and discovered how much he didn’t know.

“In current political discourse it’s commonly assumed that we in the over 65 generation are ‘greedy geezers,’ out to protect or own interests at all costs,” says James Sabin. “Our belief is that many of the elderly are also concerned with the needs of all age groups and future generations, and that we want to see our own direct interests addressed in ways that are fair and sustainable. Over 65 aims to give a voice to that perspective.”

“In Over 65, we discuss our own personal concerns about getting old while at the same time examining issues that are front and center in American life today,” says Callahan.

For more information, please contact Susan Gilbert, public affairs and communications manager, gilberts@thehastingscenter.org.

Contact: Susan Gilbert, gilberts@thehastingtscenter.org,  Phone: 845 424 4040 ext. 222