The WHO Study on Global AGEing and Adult Health (SAGE) was planned as a longitudinal study that would generate nationally representative cohorts of persons aged 50 years and older in China, Ghana, India, Mexico, Russian Federation and South Africa. SAGE will additionally develop methodologies to improve cross-population comparability of health and well-being data as making comparisons that are valid are key to providing evidence for policy and to monitor trends over time. More information, survey materials and results for SAGE pilot are available through: www.who.int/healthinfo/systems/sage/en/index.html. The survey partner from the World Health Survey (WHS) will be used again in each country, except for China and South Africa. The Ministry of Health in China and the Human Sciences Research Council, with the Ministry of Health, in South Africa will be the respective partners in these countries. At the time of writing, a pilot has been completed in three countries (Ghana, India and Tanzania, total N=1525), a training workshop for primary investigators from all participating countries and fieldsites completed and data collection started in a number of sites.This proposal outlines a request for continuation funding for the NIA-funded WHO Study on Global Ageing and Adult Health (SAGE). NIA is currently the sole donor for SAGE and has provided funding for development, cognitive testing and pretesting of the SAGE survey instruments. The current NIA budget covers the first full round of data collection for SAGE, to be completed in 2007. Data editing and analyses will occur through the middle quarters of 2007.
