A/HRC/42/43 C. Human rights impact and challenges 1. Context gap 44. Discrimination against older persons in emergency setting may be manifested at the individual level, whereby responders and relief workers act under prejudicial assumptions regarding age and older persons, in which case the latter receive inadequate, unequal or otherwise inadequate services and treatment. It may also be structural, including relating to data collection, but also planning and operational management and reporting, in which case older persons remain virtually invisible to policymakers and to the agencies implementing emergency planning and response operations. 45. When data are collected, older persons are often frequently either overlooked or treated as if all persons over the age of 60 belonged to a homogenous population, even though the needs, vulnerabilities and capacities of the old and the older-old (those 80 years of age and over) are considerably different. 46. Lack of data disaggregated by age can have a significant impact on planning and operational response to emergency situations. If older persons are invisible during the planning phase and preparedness assessments (that is, if data are not disaggregated by age and older persons are not involved in the planning process itself), the likelihood that the needs, capacities and contributions of older persons will be overlooked in the response and recovery phase sharply increases 47. Serious challenges in collecting data on older persons include the determination of age and the setting of a cut-off age for persons to be considered old, regardless of sociocultural factors and the general context. Household surveys, which are used frequently in assessments, can be biased given that data are collected by communicating with one person in the household, and may therefore not reflect the needs of older persons. Similarly, expenditure surveys do not indicate the allocation of funds, nor the control of resources within a household. 48. Reasons for not collecting disaggregated data may include cost factors but also a lack of knowledge of how to carry out larger, contextual generation analyses, and the lack of knowledge of the pre-crisis context. Even in cases of emergencies where disaggregated data are collected, most operatives in the field do not necessarily know how to use the data to improve programming. 16 Without data disaggregated by age, however, an emergency response cannot respond to the human rights concerns of older persons. 2. Right to housing 49. Housing, land and property rights are a key concern in emergency situations, including for older persons. Limited mobility and the wish of older persons to be close to their familiar surroundings despite the increased risks are elements that have to be taken into consideration when discussing adequate housing solutions. 50. Criteria for adequacy of housing encompass accessibility, affordability, habitability, security of tenure, cultural adequacy, suitability of location, and access to essential services, such as health care. Safety standards aimed at reducing damage in the event of future disasters is also a criterion for adequacy. 51. Shelter accommodation conditions often are not fit for older persons, who may need to be closer to certain facilities, such as toilets, or be closer to their families at all times. Older persons with disabilities disproportionately experience poor housing conditions, which increase the risk related to emergencies and disasters and must be accounted for in the planning process.17 52. Housing and property that older persons are forced to leave behind in emergency situations can be at risk of looting, arbitrary or illegal occupation or further destruction. On 16 17 10 Dyan Mazurana, Prisca Benelli, Human Gupta and Peter Walker, Sex and Age Matter: Improving Humanitarian Response in Emergencies, (Feinstein International Center, Tufts University, 2011). https://media.ifrc.org/ifrc/world-disaster-report-2018/.