“To go crazy, to snap and that's it…” coronavirus pandemic and nursing homes in Croatia

Abstract

Starting from the assumption that the COVID-19 pandemic has had the strongest impact on social groups that were already vulnerable and marginalized, and underlined existing social inequalities, I focus on some of the consequences of pandemic control measures on the daily lives of elderly people. In the first part of the paper, I deal with the ?positioning? of elderly people in the context of COVID-19 protection measures - which, following the recommendations of the World Health Organization, were adopted by individual countries - discussing the features of ageism that can be read from them. Later I focus on the characteristics of protection measures in nursing homes in Croatia and, using as material media articles that thematize the lives of the people in these institutions, indicate some of the consequences of a strict prevention regime on the lives of these people, their mental and physical health but also some of the fundamental human rights, such as dignity, freedom, and equality.