This article will address an important public health issue: falling in elderly people. Many older people fall, some frequently. This leads to fear and injury, the latter sometimes fatal. Falls have an associated high financial cost to the health and social services. There are many reasons why older people fall, some physiological and some physical. A better understanding of these reasons has led to improved preventative measures. With an ever increasing proportion of the population living beyond their 7th decade, fall prevention has become an important public health target. All of these issues will be discussed in more detail.