Fast-track Innovation: Area Agencies on Aging Respond to the COVID-19 Pandemic

ABSTRACT

Millions of older Americans depend on services provided by Area Agencies on Aging to support their nutritional, social, and health needs. Social distancing requirements and the closure of congregate activities due to COVID-19 resulted in a rapid and dramatic shift in service delivery modes. Area Agencies on Aging were able to quickly pivot due to their long-standing expertise in community needs assessment and cross-sectoral partnerships. The federal Coronavirus relief measures also infused one billion dollars into the Aging Network. As the pandemic response evolves, Area Agencies on Aging are poised to be key partners in a transformed health system.

KEYWORDS:

• Area agencies on aging
• cross-sectoral partnerships
• COVID-19 response
• integrated care
• social determinants of health

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Correction Statement

This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Notes

^1. AAAs were established in a 1973 amendment to the Older Americans Act (OAA) of 1965, and given a very specific role in their communities. The most recent reauthorization of OAA signed into law on March 25, the Supporting Older Americans Act of 2020 (Robertson, 2020), reaffirms the initial enabling legislation that gave the Aging Network the community-centered mandate to design and deliver services that best meet the needs of older adults in their local area with agility, flexibility and adherence to shared underlying principles. For background on the role and evolution of the OAA and AAAs, see (Applebaum et al., 2018; Kunkel, 2019).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by The John A. Hartford Foundation [2018-0195] and The SCAN Foundation [19-010].