We are, it turns out, a species that refuses to believe its own birth certificate. 

Australia is ageing, fast. This is not new here, or in Europe and North America where the trend has existed for decades. 

But even in China and now India, the fertility rate has dropped below replacement levels – even the two most populous nations on earth are getting older.  

Yet we’ve built a world — our economies, our cities, our pension systems, our cultures — around the young and the productive. So, what happens when that's no longer who we are? 

GUESTS:

Prof Paul Komesaroff is a philosopher at Monash University. And a practising endocrinologist. And Director of the Centre for Ethics in Medicine and Society.  

Dr Lee-Fay Low is Professor in Ageing and Health at University of Sydney. She’s also a registered psychologist and chairs the Sydney Dementia Network.