HEALTH AND AGING: REFLEXIONS FROM THE SOCIAL DEMOGRAPHIC SCENE

Abstract

This text is intended to describe and analise the demographic and health context of the 17ª Coordenadoria Regional de Saúde/Secretaria Estadual de Saúde/ Rio Grande do Sul. In the last decades Brazil is coming through several changes in its demographic pattern, emphasizing the grown in the number of elderly people in the population. The decrease in the fecundity and mortality taxes and the increase in the longevity are the factors that contribute to the improving of population aging. The aspects related to the aging are wide and complex, involving social and collective issues. For that, it’s important to study the demographic space, social demographic and the health, analyzing the factors that benefit or damage the longevity of a certain population. Based in the data related to the demography, the changes in the age ranges that happened in this region were analyzed. Regarding the health, the analysis showed that the system adopted in this territory follows the orientations of the Brazilian health system, emphasizing the Sistema Único de Saúde (SUS), in what happened the rearrangement of the sanitarian practice and the organization of the services. Noticing that the structure available to assist the demands of the population is still not enough, the adoption of different forms to confront the assistance, treatment and rehab, besides the implantation of politics and preventive actions and promoting health, to the whole population, with the object to promote the active and healthy aging are needed.