{"id":731718,"date":"2026-06-12T09:56:13","date_gmt":"2026-06-12T09:56:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/731718\/"},"modified":"2026-06-12T09:56:13","modified_gmt":"2026-06-12T09:56:13","slug":"with-eye-to-israels-future-israeli-experts-help-launch-european-healthy-aging-initiative","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/731718\/","title":{"rendered":"With eye to Israel’s future, Israeli experts help launch European healthy-aging initiative"},"content":{"rendered":"

Israeli experts are helping launch a new international healthy-aging initiative at Lithuania\u2019s parliament on Friday, hoping the European effort will also help Israel prepare for the pressures of an older population.<\/p>\n

Currently, 22% of Europe\u2019s population is 65 or older, according to Eurostat,<\/a> compared with about 13% of Israel\u2019s population, according to official Israeli figures<\/a> for 2026.<\/p>\n

While there have been national parliamentary initiatives on aging in Israel and the United Kingdom before, the International Parliamentary Cooperation Initiative for Healthy Ageing and Longevity is the first formal international plan bringing together experts and lawmakers from countries around the world.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe goal is to help Europe, and if Israel is part of the European initiative, then all the policies that will be developed will benefit Israel as well,\u201d said Ilia Stambler, who led a research paper that contributed to the formation of the Lithuanian initiative, speaking to The Times of Israel via video call.<\/p>\n

Although the Israeli birth rate is higher than that of Europe, Stambler said that the health and economic challenges of an aging population \u201care coming for us too.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\u201cWe hope that crucial policies that are developed now in Europe will also be enacted in Israel before it\u2019s too late,\u201d Stambler said.<\/p>\n

Stambler is the founder and chairman of the International Longevity Alliance, and chairman of the Israeli organization Vetek (Seniority) Association \u2013 the Movement for Longevity and Quality of Life.<\/p>\n

Shelly Hugler Livne, Israel\u2019s ambassador to Lithuania, told The Times of Israel that the initiative combines \u201cIsrael\u2019s cutting-edge technology, innovation, digitalization, and startups\u201d with Lithuania\u2019s \u201cvery strong scientific community that will benefit both nations, Europe, and the entire world.\u201d<\/p>\n

Livne, who will attend the Friday launch, said the effort \u201cis not only about adding years to life, but adding life to years.\u201d<\/p>\n

The effort \u2018is not only about adding years to life, but adding life to years\u2019<\/p>\n

Along with Stambler, about a dozen other Israelis are in Lithuania to participate in the initiative, as well as World Health Organization representatives, politicians, and scientists from around the world.\n<\/p>\n

Some of the initiative\u2019s goals include promoting research and innovation in healthy longevity, public education for healthy aging, facilitating access to technical, analytical, and scientific support from expert networks and research institutions, and improving professional training for the longevity workforce.<\/p>\n

\t\"\"<\/a>
\n\t\tIlia Stambler, PhD, speaks at the Lithuanian Parliament in October 2025. (Courtesy)<\/p>\n

This initiative grew out of a conference that Stambler, as the International Longevity Alliance chairman, helped to organize in the Lithuanian Parliament in 2025.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe success was so great that various institutions in five Lithuanian cities, including the Academy of Sciences and several universities, are getting involved in promoting healthy aging,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Developing a \u2018clear policy toward aging\u2019<\/p>\n

Aging is a major risk factor for all chronic diseases, including cancer, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and neurodegenerative disorders.<\/p>\n

Moreover, non-communicable aging-related diseases account for approximately 90%<\/a> of all deaths in Europe, according to the World Health Organization.<\/p>\n

Age-related illnesses contribute to 7% to 10% of the gross domestic product across EU member states<\/p>\n

These age-related illnesses contribute to a significant share of healthcare expenditure, estimated at 7% to 10% of the gross domestic product across EU member states.\n<\/p>\n

The initiative\u2019s goal is to plan policies that shift the focus of scientific and medical research away from individual diseases and toward geroscience, a research field that zeroes in on the aging process itself to prevent age-related ill health.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe European Union focuses on individual diseases, and it doesn\u2019t have a clear policy toward aging,\u201d Stambler said.<\/p>\n

\t\"\"<\/a>
\n\t\tAlex Fridman, an Israeli activist and founder of the association Disabled, Not Half a Human Being, speaks at a conference on healthy aging in the Lithuanian Parliament in October 2025. (Courtesy)<\/p>\n

Stambler led a peer-reviewed paper calling for the establishment of a coordinated support program on healthy aging and longevity, which recently appeared in Mechanisms in Ageing and Development<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The authors of the paper, including more than 80 researchers and experts in the field from over 100 international organizations, urged the European Union to increase support for healthy longevity research.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re advancing ideas to set policy for healthier aging, and to prepare society for people living even longer than ever before,\u201d said Stambler, whose efforts have been supported by Vetek, the Israeli Health Ministry, and the Israel-Europe Research and Innovation Directorate.<\/p>\n

Stambler said that longer periods of health, activity, and productivity will improve older citizens\u2019 quality of life and reduce pressure on Europe\u2019s healthcare and social welfare systems.<\/p>\n

\u2018The savings in healthcare and the welfare systems can free resources for wider scientific, technological, and social development\u2019<\/p>\n

At the same time, this new productivity could \u201cstimulate substantial economic growth in Europe and strengthen its innovation and competitiveness,\u201d Stambler said. \u201cThe savings in healthcare and the welfare systems can free resources for wider scientific, technological, and social development.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

Stambler added that he hoped to take \u201cthis precedent and expand it so that it will eventually reach Israel and around the world.\u201d<\/p>\n

Stambler said he is concerned about what might happen to Israel\u2019s healthcare and social welfare systems if there is another pandemic like COVID-19, in which most deaths occurred among older people.<\/p>\n

\t\"\"<\/a>
\n\t\tIllustrative: An elderly woman receives a dose of the COVID-19 vaccine at a temporary Maccabi health care center in Rehovot, January 10, 2022. (Yossi Aloni\/Flash90)<\/p>\n

\u201cCOVID-19 was a test case,\u201d Stambler said. \u201cWe saw what happened. Suddenly, there was no place in hospitals, and the healthcare and social welfare systems almost collapsed. The disease hit older people the hardest. That\u2019s what will happen again if aging health continues to deteriorate. It\u2019s time Israel addresses it. It\u2019s not as severe as Europe, but it\u2019s a matter of degrees.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIf we\u2019re able to address aging as the root cause of disease and disability, this will advance preventive medicine in a really significant way,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Even today, during times of war, people need to focus on healthy aging, he urged.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe war will end eventually,\u201d Stambler said, \u201cbut aging will continue, and we need to address it.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Israeli experts are helping launch a new international healthy-aging initiative at Lithuania\u2019s parliament on Friday, hoping the European…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":731719,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[263424,49,48,84,392,263426,263425,82401,46899,8624,13125,993,260183],"class_list":["post-731718","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-healthcare","tag-aging-research","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-health","tag-healthcare","tag-israel-lithuania-ties","tag-israeli-research","tag-israeli-science","tag-lithuania","tag-longevity","tag-medical-research","tag-scientific-research","tag-weizmann-institute"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/731718","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=731718"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/731718\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/731719"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=731718"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=731718"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=731718"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}