[Guide] Strengthening social connection through age-friendly cities and communities

This living guide is a communications and advocacy resource produced by the Secretariat of the World Health Organization (WHO) Commission on Social Connection, in collaboration with the WHO Global Network for Age-friendly Cities and Communities (GNAFCC)1, through the WHO Age-friendly Environments Knowledge and Action Hub on Social Connection. The guide translates key recommendations from the flagship report of the WHO Commission on Social Connection for age-friendly cities and communities, building on WHO work and resources on healthy ageing, age-friendly environments and the United Nations (UN) Decade of Healthy Ageing (2021–2030), as well as the experience of GNAFCC members and Affiliates. It will be updated over time as feedback, practice-based learning and new evidence emerge, including through the Hub and the wider GNAFCC network.

The guide is for everyone involved in developing age-friendly cities and communities (AFCCs), including coordinators at community and national levels, practitioners, researchers and members of civil society. While rooted in the WHO age-friendly cities and communities framework, it will also be relevant to action on healthy cities,

urban health and healthy ageing programmes more broadly. The guide aims to:

• strengthen understanding of the importance of social connection in healthy ageing, and of healthy ageing in sustaining social connection;
• highlight how AFCC frameworks are already built to support social connection, with many AFCC initiatives already aligned with evidence-based approaches;
• suggest ways in which AFCCs can further integrate and strengthen action on social connection.

Whether the focus of action is on improving the health of older people or improving health across the life course more broadly, strengthening work on social connection will help to maximize health and wider social benefits for people, communities and the AFCC approach itself.