QUEEN’S University has launched Northern Ireland’s largest ever public health research project.
NICOLA — the Northern Ireland Cohort for the Longitudinal Study of Ageing — is hoping to provide the basis for future Government policy by
following the lives of 8,500 over 50s as they grow older.
Officially announced by junior ministers Jonathan Bell and Jennifer McCann, participants in the Queen’s University-led project, supported by groups such as the Public Health Agency and the Commissioner for Older People of Northern Ireland, will be randomly selected from across Northern Ireland over the next 18 months.
The findings will leave a lasting legacy for society by enabling policy makers to base Government strategy upon research.
Professor Ian Young, principal investigator of the NICOLA project, said: “Northern Ireland is undergoing an ageing revolution.
Today there are more people aged under 16 than over 65. By 2037, that will have completely reversed with predictions that there will be 122,000 more over 65s than under 16s.
That is an unprecedented change in our society and we need to start planning for it.
“Through the NICOLA study, Queen’s will give policy makers in Northern Ireland the same level of information as their counterparts in Britain and Ireland, and it will help shape at least 10 major Government policies.”