My gut reaction was that they may not quite understand the protecting other people aspect, and aren’t all that afraid of potential death themselves. Particularly those who are alone and have lost their spouse and other family members etc. Many of them live their life in a state of being ready to move on, so there is little motivation for them to be compliant. They are also the age group that are less likely to get called out for it- we all tend to be a little more forgiving of them in day to day life.To be devil’s advocate, it could be that elderly folks have the mindset that “if i had it, id know” given theyre less likely to be asymptomatic spreaders.
Kind of like how we wouldn’t give them the evil eye for sneaking a couple grapes in their mouth in the produce section. Well, these days we might not like that so much either...haha