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Statement Of Alek Sripipatana
Environmental Protection Agency
Aging Initiative Public Listening Session
Los Angeles, California
April 29, 2003
Alek Sripipatana, MPH
Research Associate
UCLA Center for Health Policy Research
Research Associate
UCLA Center for Health Policy Research
My name is Alek Sripipatana, and I am a PhD student in the School of Public Health at UCLA.
For the purposes of brevity and reducing redundancy, I will limit my comments to three points:
Firstly, I'd like to commend the EPA on including older adults and their concerns into the Agency's national agenda on the environment. To often, we act in a paternalistic manner and exclude our older adults from discourse that concerns them.
Secondly, I'd like to commend the EPA for acknowledging that older adults are an underutilized resource and have much to offer, if given the opportunity to do so, as highlighted in the EPA's bullet on "Encouraging volunteerism among older persons."
Society has a tendency to underestimate the resilience, resourcefulness, and potential people exhibit in old age. As a student of gerontology, it never ceases to amaze me as to the amount of human potential that unfolds across the life course, and the envelope of ability that is pushed in latter life; for instance, John Glenn's venture into space at the ripe age of 77 (October 29, 1998). Time and time again, our older adults have demonstrated that "they can," they do," and "they have done" beyond the point of anecdote. Furthermore, we have to challenge the restricted expectations and worth that society has imposed on older persons.
With that I'd like to make my third point. that the EPA takes into account and applies full value of older persons when establishing its calculus for human life in benefit-cost analysis for environmental programs.