Art Competition for the World Health Day 2012
The Theme: Ageing and Health
Dear Students
The theme of World Health Day 2012 is ageing and health. The main message is that ageing is a sign of good health and reflects improvements in global health. Along with this positive trend, however, come special health challenges for the 21st century. Among these is preparing health providers and societies to meet the needs of older populations, which is essential and must include training for health professionals on old-age care, preventing and managing age-associated chronic diseases and developing age-friendly services and settings.
Why the theme of healthy ageing?
Ageing is a global phenomenon. The elderly population – people 60 years of age and older – is the fastest growing age group worldwide. Currently the global elderly population is 650 million, and it is expected to reach 2 billion by 2050.
Life expectancy in countries like Japan and France is already more than 80 years. At the same time, in several countries in Africa, this figure is 40 years lower.
Health expenditures increase with age but are concentrated in the last two years of life, regardless of how old someone is. As people live longer, it is important to ensure that their added years are healthy, so that health care costs can be kept manageable.
Healthy older people represent a resource for their families, communities and economies.
What is everyone’s role?
Providing care for elderly people is a social and humanitarian role for all members of the community. In general, training for health professionals includes little if any instruction about specific care for older people. However, they will increasingly spend time caring for this section of the population. WHO maintains that all health providers should be trained on ageing issues, regardless of their profession.
Dear Students
Did you know that disasters and emergencies severely impact older people? For example, the highest percentage of fatalities caused by the 2004 tsunami in Indonesia were among people 60 years of age and older, and the majority of victims of the 2003 heat wave in Europe were people 70 years of age and older. Policies to protect older persons during emergencies are urgently required. You may express these concepts in drawing and in colour.
Conditions:
Entries may be submitted in any form of drawing or painting by school children aged 8–18
Entries can be made on appropriate drawing paper, using any type of colouring.
Entries should be sent to the WHO Representative in your country, or to the Director of the Department of International Relations, Ministry of Health, so that they can be forwarded to the Eastern Mediterranean Regional Office.
The last date for receiving entries is end of February 2012.
Entries shall be judged according to age groups as follows: 8–9, 10–11, 12–13, 14–15 and 16–18.
Referees will sit at the Regional Office in Cairo to judge all entries and their verdict shall be final.
WHO is not required to return any winning or non-winning entries to their owners.
WHO reserves the right to use the submitted artwork in its publications.
Every entry must include the form attached to this document, and must show the following information:
The full name of the Entrant
His/her country
Age
Full home address
Name and address of the school
Telephone number (if any)
The above information must be legibly written, and preferably typed.
Drawings submitted without the above information will be disregarded.
Winners will receive prizes equal to US$ 200, US$ 175, US$ 150, US$ 125 and US$ 100 respectively, as well as Certificates of Merit. An exhibit will be held for winning drawings at the Regional Office premises in Cairo.
NOTE FOR SCHOOLS AND ART TEACHERS
Schools are kindly requested to be selective in the entries they submit. While all students are strongly encouraged to take part in the competition in order to raise their awareness about the theme of World Health Day, the referees will consider promising entries only. Children should be assisted in completing the form legibly and in full.
Art Competition 2012 Form (printable quality)
