World Elder Abuse Awareness Day (WEAAD) is observed on June 15 each year. The purpose of WEAAD is to provide an opportunity for communities around the world to promote a better understanding of abuse and neglect of older persons. In truth, there are organizations, agencies, and people in our community who work every day to raise awareness about elder abuse, financial exploitation, support for older victims of crime, information on how to pursue civil or criminal action if appropriate, and on finding safe housing for those who need it. However, without the support of friends, family, clergy, community, and YOU, prevention of elder abuse is just out of grasp.

The National Center on Elder Abuse and the Keck School of Medicine USC have recently updated their “Research to Practice Briefs” on this topic. These briefs offer new information on mistreatment of cultural subgroups of older adult survivors.

June 15, we marked World Elder Abuse Awareness Day (WEAAD). The year’s theme was Lifting up the Voices of Older Survivors. NVRDC endeavors to provide outreach and education throughout the year, but WEAAD allowed us to highlight the issue, assess how far we’ve come in combating elder abuse, and where we need to focus in the year to come. The new year brought a new virus. As the novel corona virus spread through communities and long-term care facilities across the country, we saw some disappointing ageist rhetoric about the value of older adults and the expendability of their lives to save the economy. We have also seen how racism has impacted older adults from attacks on Asian Americans to the higher mortality rates of older American minority groups as a result of systemic racism. And we know there is a correlation between ageism and abuse.

Older District residents may be feeling the impacts of this social isolation deeply. Seniors may be fearful of being exposed to the virus and need food, medicines or just a friendly hello. While many of us are connected to the internet through a variety of devices, many older Americans may not have access to the internet via a computer or mobile phone or may be dependent on someone else to access the outside world.