The COVID-19 pandemic has sparked unprecedented public health and social measures (PHSM) by national and local governments, including border restrictions, school closures, mandatory facemask use and stay at home orders. Quantifying the effectiveness of these interventions in reducing disease transmission is key to rational policy making in response to the current and future pandemics. In order to estimate the effectiveness of these interventions, detailed descriptions of their timelines, scale and scope are needed. The Health Intervention Tracking for COVID-19 (HIT-COVID) is a curated and standardized global database that catalogues the implementation and relaxation of COVID-19 related PHSM. With a team of over 200 volunteer contributors, we assembled policy timelines for a range of key PHSM aimed at reducing COVID-19 risk for the national and first administrative levels (e.g. provinces and states) globally, including details such as the degree of implementation and targeted populations. We continue to maintain and adapt this database to the changing COVID-19 landscape so it can serve as a resource for researchers and policymakers alike.

BackgroundTo investigate risk factors associated with low subjective well-being (SWB) in men and women (≥65 years) separately with a special focus on emotional distress.MethodsA cross-sectional analysis was conducted among 3602 participants (50.6% women) aged 65-90 years (mean age 72.8 years, SD ± 5.8) from the population-based KORA-Age study conducted in 2008/2009. SWB was assessed using the WHO-5 well-being index (score range: 0 to 100). SWB was dichotomized into “low” (score ≤ 50) and “high” (score > 50) SWB. The association between potential risk factors and SWB was assessed by logistic regressions analyses. Population-attributable risks (PARs) were calculated.ResultsLow SWB was significantly higher in women than in men (23.8% versus 18.2%; p < 0.0001). The logistic regressions analyses revealed low income, physical inactivity, multimorbidity, depression, anxiety and sleeping problems to be associated with low SWB in both sexes. Living alone increased the odds of having low SWB in women, but not in men. Depression and anxiety were the strongest risk factors of low SWB among men (depression: OR: 4.19, 95% CI: 1.33-13.17, p < 0.05; anxiety: 8.45, 5.14-13.87, p < 0.0001) and women (depression: 6.83, 2.49-18.75 p < 0.05; anxiety: 7.31, 5.14-10.39, p < 0.0001). In both sexes, anxiety had the highest population-attributable risk (men: 27%, women: 41%).ConclusionOur results call out for an increased focus on mental health interventions among older adults, especially for women living alone. Further research is needed to understand the paradoxical pattern of discrepant subjective well-being versus objective health in age.

Background and Objectives Given their increasing prevalence with age, chronic health conditions (CHCs) are substantially affecting older workers and organizations. An important question is whether and how flexible work arrangements and organizational climates may help to reduce the work limitations experienced by older workers. Grounded on the Job Demand–Resource model, we hypothesize that access to flexible work arrangements (working-time flexibility, workplace flexibility, phased retirement) and supportive organizational climates (healthy ageing climate, psychological safety climate) are vital job resources that are associated with fewer health-related work limitations among older workers experiencing CHCs. Research Design and Methods Multilevel data were collected among 5,419 older workers (60–65 years) in 624 organizations in the Netherlands. Perceived health-related work limitations of older workers diagnosed with arthritis (N = 2,330), cardiovascular disease (N = 720), and sleep disorders (N = 816) were analyzed. Results Multilevel ordered logistic regression analyses revealed that perceived access to flexible working hours and a psychologically safe organizational climate was associated with fewer health-related work limitations among older workers with CHCs. Discussion and Implications Facilitating longer working lives is a key policy challenge within organizations, in particular if older workers are constraint by CHCs. This study shows that offering flexible working hours and ensuring a psychologically safe climate, where older workers with health issues are inclined to share their work needs and preferences, are likely to contribute to healthy ageing in the workplace.