*3.1.4 Issues resulting from aging population*

Aging population is becoming a crucial challenge to economic and social sustainability. An increasing number of the elderly inflates public expenditures on pensions, and medical and nursing care [21]. Meanwhile, since disability rates increase with age, the aging population raises the percentage of people with disabilities in the population and households [5].

Current demographic changes require housing to adopt accessible and universal design [5, 6, 22]. Incorporating universal design features into homes improves safety, helping to prevent accidents caused by falls and slips [6, 22, 23]. In addition, universal design helps everyone with assistance needs, such as people with disabilities, the elderly, small children, pregnant women, and people with a temporary injury or illness [24, 25]. Furthermore, including universal design principles in

#### *Sustainable Housing*

advance leads to a drastic reduction of future renovation costs. According to the Victorian Government of Australia, the cost of incorporating fundamental universal design features into a new home is more than 20 times cheaper than retrofitting such features into an existing home [26, 27].
