Elder abuse by abandonment in India: a novel community awareness and intervention strategy.

India, along with the rest of the world, is aging rapidly, but more so. Of a total population of over 1.2 billion, the aging population over 60 years is 109 million, projected to rise above 300 million by the year 2050, exceeding the younger population. One important ramification of this highly populous and under-resourced setting is that it provides a ripe environment for elder abuse (Chokkanathan and Lee, 2005), a problem besetting vulnerable aging populations globally (Patterson and Ploeg, 2007).