Lifespan. David Sinclair
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Bacon,
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C. Kenyon, J. Chang, E. Gensch, et al., “A
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L. Partridge and P. H. Harvey, “Methuselah Among Nematodes,”
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“Decelerated aging,” Gems wrote, “has an element of tragic inevitability: its benefits to health compel us to pursue it, despite the transformation of human society, and even human nature, that this could entail.” D. Gems, “Tragedy and Delight: The Ethics of Decelerated Ageing,”
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“You know the cartoon where Bugs Bunny is driving an old car that suddenly falls apart, every bolt sprung, with the last hubcap rattling in a circle until it comes to rest?”
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“Really, people don’t die of old age,” Chris Weller wrote on Medical Daily. “Something else has to be going on.” C. Weller, “Can People Really Die of Old Age?,” “The Unexamined Life,” Medical Daily, January 21, 2015, http://www.medicaldaily.com/can-people-really-die-old-age-318528.
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B. Gompertz, “On the Nature of the Function Expressive of the Law of Human Mortality, and on a New Mode of Determining the Value of Life Contingencies,”
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D. A. Sinclair and L. Guarente, “Extrachromosomal rDNA Circles—A Cause of Aging in Yeast,”
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Based on global population estimates and census reports, among other sources, the World Bank plotted out a fifty-six-year period ending in 2016 that showed life expectancy increasing from 52 to 72. “Life Expectancy at Birth, Total (Years),” The World Bank, https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.DYN.LE00.IN.
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I inherited the SERPINA1 mutation from my mother. Even though I have never smoked, I find it hard to breathe in some situations, such as when I am visiting a place with substantial pollution. Armed with this information, I avoid breathing in dust and other contaminants when possible. I feel empowered knowing the genetic instructions within each of my cells, an experience that previous generations never had.
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A. M. Binder, C. Corvalan, V. Mericq, et al., “Faster Ticking Rate of the Epigenetic Clock Is Associated with Faster Pubertal Development in Girls,”
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Women over 65 are more prone to hip fractures, with sepsis being the main cause of death. Researchers have linked the sepsis to poor medical care, a lack of family support, and dementia. “Time wise, mortality was found to be higher within the first six months, with 10 deaths (50%), and within the first year, with six deaths (30%).” J. Negrete-Corona, J. C. Alvarano-Soriano, and L. A. Reyes-Santiago, “Hip Fracture as Risk Factor for Mortality in Patients over 65 Years of Age. Case-Control Study” (abstract translation from Spanish),
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Up to 74 percent of patients who have a foot amputated due to diabetes die within five years of surgery. The authors argue for more aggressive focus on the issue by doctors and patients alike. “New-onset diabetic foot ulcers should be considered a marker for significantly increased mortality and should be aggressively managed locally, systemically, and psychologically.” J. M. Robbins, G. Strauss, D. Aron, et al., “Mortality Rates and Diabetic Foot Ulcers: Is It Time to Communicate Mortality Risk to Patients with Diabetic Foot Ulceration?,”
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Have we made a deal with the medical devil that’s backfired? Olshansky certainly thinks so, contrasting the quest for human longevity and health to the dark narrative of Faust’s ultimately pyrrhic deal with Mephistopheles. “It’s possible that humanity has squeezed about as much healthy life out of public health interventions as possible and that the human body is now running up against inherent limits that the genetically fixed attributes of our biology impose.” S. J. Olshansky, “The Future of Health,”
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The numbers are indeed staggering: close to 800,000 Americans die annually of cardiovascular-related diseases; medical costs related to cardiovascular issues are expected to be over $818 billion by 2030 and lost productivity costs above $275 billion. “Heart Disease and Stroke Cost America Nearly $1 Billion a Day in Medical Costs, Lost Productivity,” CDC Foundation, April 29, 2015, https://www.cdcfoundation.org/pr/2015/heart-disease-and-stroke-cost-america-nearly-1-billion-day-medical-costs-lost-productivity.
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As treatments for patients with disease have prolonged their lives, so the amount of disease in society has augmented. This situation means that the only way to increase the human healthspan will be by “‘delaying aging,’ or delaying the physiological change that results in disease and disability,” the author argues. Along with scientific breakthroughs, changes in socioeconomic inequalities, lifestyle, and behavior can contribute to improving both healthspan and lifespan. E. M. Crimmins, “Lifespan and Healthspan: Past, Present, and Promise,”
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According to the World Health Organization, one DALY can be thought of as one lost year of “healthy” life. The sum of these DALYs across the population, or the burden of disease, can be thought of as a measurement of the gap between current health status and an ideal health situation in which the entire population lives to an advanced age, free of disease and disability. “Metrics: Disability-Adjusted Life Year (DALY),” World Health Organization, https://www.who.int/healthinfo/global_burden_disease/metrics_daly/en/.
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And almost everyone at that age spends a considerable part of his or her life visiting the doctor. According to the study, published in 2009 by the
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The possibility that both genetic and epigenetic aging are needed for a tumor to develop we’ve termed “geroncogenesis,” and it explains why tumors don’t occur in young people even after extreme sun exposure, why it often takes decades for DNA damage to lead to a tumor even if you avoid the sun later in life, and why cancers often have an unusual metabolism (named after the physicist Otto Warburg), one that directly consumes glucose, has decreased mitochondrial activity, and uses less oxygen to make energy, similar to the metabolism of old cells.