With the most vulnerable demographic during the coronavirus pandemic being the elderly, it is interesting to note that Greece’s share of elderly population is above the EU average.
According to the latest data released by Eurostat, in 2019, 20.3% of the EU population was aged 65 years or over; this was 0.3 percentage points higher than a year before and 2.9 percentage points higher than the corresponding share from a decade earlier.
Across the EU Member States, the highest share of the elderly in the total population in 2019 was observed in Italy (22.8%), followed by Greece (22.0%), Portugal and Finland (21.8% each), Germany (21.5%) and Bulgaria (21.3%). The lowest shares were recorded in Ireland (14.1%) and in Luxembourg (14.4%).
At regional level, the highest shares of elderly people were found in Chemnitz (28.9%) in Germany, followed by Liguria (28.5%) in Italy, Ipeiros (27.0%) in Greece, Limousin (26.7%) in France and Sachsen-Anhalt (26.5%) in Germany. The lowest shares were recorded in Mayotte (2.7%) and Guyane (5.8%) in France and in Ciudad Autónoma de Melilla (10.7%) in Spain.
