As the median age of populations around the world increases, due to the provision of better diets and better medical care, the number of elderly persons vulnerable to mental illness will inevitably increase too. We are not good at providing high-quality geriatric care, even in high-income countries. For example, Age Concern (a UK-based charity) states on its website: ‘Health and social care services have made some progress in tackling age discrimination, but older people still report feeling that they have had second class treatment and care simply because of their age’ (www.ageconcern.org.uk/AgeConcern/ageism-in-healthcare.asp). How much worse these matters are in low- and middle-income countries is the subject of our theme in this issue. We have drawn articles from three distinct geographic regions: India, Africa and South-East Asia. We often assume that cultural factors in lower-income areas lead to greater respect for, and better care of, the elderly than we experience in many parts of the Western hemisphere. This appears to be a misapprehension, and attitudes towards the elderly are changing as the impact of industrialisation increases.