Monthly Archives: August 2021

As La Jolla schools welcome students back to campus for a new academic year amid the continuing COVID-19 pandemic, local experts are passing along lessons for keeping children safer in both their physical and mental health.

With coronavirus cases surging from the highly contagious Delta variant, one of the most important things that parents can do is make sure that their kids are comfortable wearing masks all day, said Rebecca Fielding-Miller, an epidemiologist and assistant professor at the Herbert Wertheim School of Public Health and Human Longevity Science at UC San Diego.

All schools are mandated by the state to require staff and students to wear masks indoors, regardless of COVID-19 vaccination status. Fielding-Miller said its important to ensure that children have a mask that fits them well that they like, because the best mask is one that stays on your face.

Rebecca Fielding-Miller, an epidemiologist and assistant professor at UC San Diego, says students and parents should be kind as the school year opens. Its kind to wear a mask, its kind to get vaccinated, she says.

(Courtesy of Rebecca Fielding-Miller)

She advised parents to stock kids backpacks with an extra one or two in case the first becomes damp or soiled.

We know that masks are pretty effective, especially if everybody is wearing one, she said.

As to whether children should be asked to wear masks outdoors (currently, most La Jolla schools are not requiring that), Fielding-Miller said: Personally, I would prefer that my kid keep her mask on, especially if shes in like a larger setting with a lot of kids.

We know that outside is much safer than inside because its the open air. It is less dangerous. But why take a chance?

Its really scary that kids [younger than 12] cant get vaccinated, Fielding-Miller said. A lot of data is coming out that when kids, especially smaller kids, get sick, theyre actually very likely to pass it on to somebody in their household.

One of the best things we can do to protect our kids is make sure that were vaccinated. The more [vaccinated] people who surround somebody who cant get vaccinated, the safer that person is.

Since schools have done away with temperature and other health screenings implemented last academic year, Fielding-Miller said its important to keep children with symptoms such as a fever, cough, stomach trouble or headache home from school.

Its a bummer for everybody, but I think it is good to be sort of extra cautious with Delta going around, she said.

Fielding-Miller, who also runs an environmental COVID-19 monitoring project at schools in high-risk communities, said her most important advice is to be kind. Its kind to wear a mask, its kind to get vaccinated.

Still, there continues to be pushback against mask and vaccine requirements at schools and elsewhere. An Aug. 21 rally at San Diegos Waterfront Park drew about 150 people who urged the recall of Gov. Gavin Newsom, largely because of his COVID-19 mandates.

That followed a protest at the San Diego County Board of Supervisors meeting Aug. 17 that drew about 300 demonstrators and more than 100 speakers, most of whom assailed state and local restrictions initiated in response to the pandemic.

And last month, area parents group Let Them Breathe filed a lawsuit against the state seeking to end the mask mandate for schools. The group argues that masks can harm childrens social, mental and physical health and should be a choice for families, not a requirement.

Katherine Nguyen Williams, a UC San Diego psychiatry professor, says putting feelings into words can help reduce anxiety.

(Courtesy of Katherine Nguyen Williams)

Katherine Nguyen Williams, a professor of psychiatry in the UCSD School of Medicine, said that in preparing to send their children back to school, parents should familiarize themselves with the latest school guidelines on masks and physical distancing and communicate those expectations to their kids.

When kids are prepared and they know what theyre walking into, theyre less anxious when things happen, Williams said. Things are more predictable for them.

She encourages parents to have their children get used to wearing masks for many hours a day, since many will not have done so over the summer or at all if they opted for online-only instruction last school year.

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Williams said parents should watch for the red flags of anxiety in children avoiding what ... theyre fearful of.

She said students may have a challenging time putting their feelings into language, so they may instead avoid school or anxiety-inducing situations such as lunchtime or a specific class. The anxiety may be exhibited in somatic sensations such as a headache or stomachache, she said.

If you give in to that, Williams said, it actually increases anxiety. She said parents need to talk to their children about whats happening during that time period that [theyre] avoiding so that we can address what it is thats anxiety-provoking ... to help [them] feel better.

Williams, a mother of four children at public schools in La Jolla, suggests regular conversations with kids to help them put their feelings into words, which will decrease anxiety.

You can model that for them, she said. You can say as a parent, I know Im feeling a little bit nervous about school opening back up and youre going to be gone all day at school and one of the things that I can do to help myself feel better is take some deep breaths. ... I talked to your teacher and shes really excited to see you.

Youre modeling, Yes, I get anxious, too, and this is what I do to help manage my anxiety.

The challenging thing with this pandemic is that different families have responded differently. Everybody has their own values and perspectives, Williams said. Peer pressure and teasing can occur because of such differences, she said, and kids dont know why its different. Thats where you can increase or improve empathy for others.

She said coming up with answers to questions in advance will help alleviate embarrassment and fear in the moment.

She recommends practicing saying something like I know that we dont have to wear a mask out here, and thats OK with me that youre not, [but] I am because my grandmother lives with us and shes elderly or sick or she cant get vaccinated.

Williams also encourages parents to reach out to others in the same school community to empathize and get answers together.

Humans are social creatures, she said. So having somebody else to reflect back your own thoughts and your own feelings and having that shared experience can help you manage your own anxiety.

San Diego Union-Tribune staff writer Deborah Sullivan Brennan contributed to this report.

Read this article:
Back-to-school stress? UCSD experts unmask strategies for keeping children healthy as they head to campuses - La Jolla Light

When Jeanne Calment of France died in 1997 at the age of 122 years and 164 days, she set a record for oldest human. That record still stands.

As statisticians who study demography, we expect that record will be broken by 2100.

We study the maximum human life span using a data-driven approach. Our peer-reviewed study, published in June 2021, models and combines two key components: how the risk of dying flattens after age 110, and growth in the number of people to reach age 110 this century.

Our analysis of these two factors, which we did before the COVID-19 pandemic, suggests it's nearly inevitable that someone will break Calment's record during the 21st century, with an 89% chance that someone will live to at least 126, but only a 3% chance that someone will reach age 132.

Scientists are actively debating whether there is a fixed limit to the human life span.

Some biologists think the data shows that aging is not a disease that can be treated, but instead an inevitable process that cannot be fully stopped, whether through medical breakthroughs or other means. Some demographers have argued that there is a natural limit to life expectancy, implying that maximum ages will level off as well.

But others think there's good evidence that life spans will continue to lengthen - at least for a lucky few. Several prominent biologists and medical experts have recently published findings suggesting there is some hope for extending life spans dramatically via medical interventions. Ultrawealthy tech titans like Tesla's Elon Musk and Google co-founder Sergey Brin are investing heavily in such research.

In 2002, two demographers named Jim Oeppen and James Vaupel observed that between 1928 and 1990, limits to life expectancy proposed by leading demographers were broken just five years after the prediction on average. They also noted that flattening gains to life expectancy should not determine our view of maximum life span, as they are quite different things the maximum is not the average!

Even a pair of prominent demographers who come down on the side of a fixed limit to human life, S. Jay Olshansky and Bruce A. Carnes, acknowledged that there is no age at which death is absolutely certain, leaving open the possibility of continually broken life span records.

Data on "supercentenarians," or those who reach age 110, are limited and often of poor quality. There is the problem of "age-attainment bias", or the tendency of very old individuals to misstate or exaggerate their age. For this reason, we've used only data from the International Database on Longevity, a collection of rigorously verified death records for supercentenarians.

Since these individuals died before 2020, they were all born no later than 1910. Because of record-keeping limitations throughout the world at that time, only records from 13 countries could be included in the database. For that reason, our study is limited to individuals from those 13 countries.

Yearly mortality rates generally increase as people age. For example, individuals are more likely to die at age 80 than age 20.

But this changes for those who make it to 110 years old. The best available data suggests that mortality rates for these "supercentenarians," while high, do not increase as they continue to age. In a sense, this means that supercentenarians stop aging.

Instead, supercentenarians as a group have a steady but very high mortality rate of about 50% per year. This means that for every 1,000 individuals who have reached age 110, we expect approximately 500 of them will have died before their 111th birthday, and 250 more by age 112. Taken to its logical end point, this pattern suggests only 1 of the 1,000 would reach age 120, and only 1 in a million supercentenarians would reach age 130.

Even more, such traditional demographic factors as sex and nationality that affect mortality rates also appear to not affect supercentenarians. But scientists have yet to figure out what factors lead supercentenarians to live as long as they do. Do they benefit from excellent genetics? Or healthy environments? Or some other factor as yet unidentified? They appear to be extraordinary individuals, but the exact reason is unclear.

That pattern led us to the second component of our study: projecting how many people will reach age 110 during the 21st century, which ends in the year 2100. Using population forecasting methods developed by our research group that are used by the United Nations, we found that large mid-20th-century population growth will likely lead to an orders-of-magnitude increase in the supercentenarian population by 2100. Our estimates suggest that about 300,000 people will reach age 110 by 2080, give or take about 100,000. Although this range is well below a million, it makes the one-in-a-million chance that at least one of them will reach age 130 a real possibility.

Predicting the extremes of humanity is a challenging task filled with unknowns. Just as it's conceivable that a medical breakthrough could let humans live indefinitely, every individual to reach age 123 could simply die the next day. Instead, our study has taken a statistical, data-driven approach focused on what will be observed this century rather than on untestable hypotheses about absolute limits to life span. Our results indicate there's only a 13% chance any individual will reach age 130, and a very tiny chance anyone lives to age 135 this century.

In other words, the data suggests that life span may not have a hard limit, but a practical one. Humans will almost certainly break Calment's record of 122 this century, but probably not by more than a decade.

While we carried out our analysis using data collected before the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic and its impact on life expectancy, we believe our overall findings remain accurate. The pandemic may lead to a somewhat smaller total number of 21st-century supercentenarians. But that reduction is unlikely to be very large, and any big effect on their mortality past 110 is unlikely to last many years into the future.

Michael Pearce, PhD Candidate in Statistics, University of Washington and Adrian Raftery, Boeing International Professor of Statistics and Sociology, University of Washington

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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Yes, the maximum life span will increase this century, but not by more than 10 years - Big Think

By Ernie Marshall

Some years ago, I took a walk along a stretch of Reedy Branch, a tributary making its way to the Tar River, with a tree specialist to pick his brain about the trees we encountered. There were a lot of old trees, virgin forest perhaps since the area was once farmland back when farmers didnt attempt to clear and farm the bottomlands or floodplains. We talked about the different look of aging trees, coming near the end of their lifespan of a century or more. Their crowns thin out, less full with fewer branches and less foliage, they often develop some lean, no longer have that straight and tall look and the oaks and hickories no longer bear nuts. They seem to look old, as if imitating our changes with age, a bit bent over and balding. They even seem to get a look of wisdom earned with age. Everything in nature ages just as do we.

Some trees are quite aged, being the oldest living things on Earth. Redwoods get to be at least 2000 years old and sequoias over 3000. Both are topped by the bristle pine, which lives 5000 years or more.

Longevity in nature is a very wide spectrum. Most herbaceous plants live only a few months, then disperse seeds to start anew. Many insects live only a matter of days or weeks. The tiger swallowtail sipping nectar in your garden may be gone tomorrow. At the other extreme, stars go through a cycle from birth to demise that lasts billions of years, when they burn all of their hydrogen and perhaps go out with a bang as a dazzling supernova. (No cause for alarm, our sun should last another five billion years, being about half way through its life span.)

Aging is not to be confused with immortality, the fact that all of us will die at some point. Aging is part of life, death is lifes opposite. We tend to think that we fear our own death. Perhaps what we fear is dying, an end stage of the life process. I think the first century B.C. Roman philosopher Lucretius summed it up by saying we have nothing to fear in our death, because when I am here death is not, and when death is here I am not. Mark Twain puts it this way: The fear of death follows from the fear of life. A man who lives fully is prepared to die at any time.

To make more interesting comparisons between the life spans of living things and get closer to home, let us consider what has been called the heartbeat hypothesis that all mammals whose longevity ranges roughly from the pygmy shrew that lives only a year or so to the bowhead whale that may live 200 years live for the duration of about one billion heartbeats.

Consider the following instances:

Pygmy shrew 1.02 billion total heartbeats (1300 bpm, 1.5 year average lifespan)

Mouse 1.31 billion (500 bpm, 5 years)

Cat 1.18 billion (150 bpm, 15 years)

Human 2.24 billion heartbeats (60 bpm, 71 years)

Horse 0.93 billion (44 bpm, 40 years)

Elephant 1.03 billion (28 bpm, 70 years)

Notice that the larger the animal gets, the slower its pulse rate. A cat is roughly 100 times larger than a mouse, but its heart rate is about a third as rapid as that of the mouse. The pygmy shrew, with it very rapid pulse, burns itself out in a year or so.

Note who breaks the one billion heartbeat rule us, humans. We get something like twice what other species get. If we followed the rule, our life expectancy would be 35 years instead of 71 years. (It is commonly thought that human life span has increased through history. It seems not, that the Bible three score and ten is fairly constant, considering only death from old age, not disease, accident, death in tribal warfare, death in childbirth, etc.).

There is a plethora of hypotheses about why our species is an exception to the one billion heartbeat rule. I will leave you to ponder or research this. I would like instead to ponder the one billion heartbeat rule.

Heartbeats seem a better measure of life than years, the pulse of a life sustaining organ in our bodies, rather than Earths annual trip around the sun.All of a sudden we have a yardstick for the lives of us and our fellow mammals.Or do we?

My dog Bullitt ages at about seven times the rate that I do. Does that mean because of his more rapid heartbeat (and metabolism) that he experiences time differently? Does his lifetime feel as long as mine?Does he experience a difference in my wife and I being away for an hour for an errand and our being a way for a weekend?Humans seem hyperconscious of time.We make plans for the future and remember the past (or worry and regret). Does my dog just live in the moment, an ever-repeated present?

Despite our dependence on watches and calendars, the experience of time with humans is largely subjective.An hour spent in a hospital waiting room for news about cancer or a newly arriving baby seems much longer.An hour with a cherished friend seems much briefer.

And since Einstein, there is no longer a cosmic yardstick in physics for the universe at large for measuring time. (The question what time is it on the moon? is totally meaningless.)

Oh my, a stroll along a stream bank looking at trees has led us to bumping into Albert Einstein. Time to conclude thiscolumn. May you have a long life, age well and fill your time with bright and memorable moments.

Editors Note: This column originally appeared in The Coastland Times in September 2020.

Ernie Marshall taught at East Carolina College for thirty-two years and had a home in Hyde County near Swan Quarter. He has done extensive volunteer work at the Mattamuskeet, Pocosin Lakes and Swan Quarter refuges and was chief script writer for wildlife documentaries by STRS Productions on the coastal U.S. National Wildlife Refuges, mostly located on the Outer Banks. Questions or comments? Contact the author at marshalle1922@gmail.com.

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The Nature Corner: Aging - The Coastland Times - The Coastland Times

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The World Health Organizationreportedthelife expectancy of an Indian to be 70.8 yearsin its 2019-20 report. Over the lasttwocenturies, Indias life expectancy has increased consistently but is still lower than the global averageof73.4 years.

Human life expectancy depends on multiple factors.A 2018review studyassessing life expectancy in low and medium human development index countries investigated health indicators of83 nations from the World Bank, WHO, United Nation Development Fund and UNICEFdatabases. The authors reported socio-economic status, healthcare system, adult literacy rate, disease burden, andthe interaction of these factorsas major determinants of life expectancy.

Unhealthy food choicesand associated risks are among the leading causes of death globally.According totheWHOs latestfactsheet(13 April 2021), noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) contribute to 71per centof global deaths. Annually, around 15 million peoplebetween30and60 years ofagedie prematurely from NCDs85per centofthese deathsare from lower and middle-income countries. Cardiovascular diseases are the most prevalent cause of death acrossthe world, followed by cancers, respiratory diseases, and diabetes. These four groups alone are responsible for 80per centof all premature deaths. Potential risk factors for NCD include lack of physical activity, poor dietary choices, excessive consumption of alcohol, tobacco, stress, etc.

Also read: Women in India live longer than men but dont have healthier lives, finds new report

A2020 studyby Manika Sharma and colleagues comparingtheIndian diet with the EAT-LancetCommissionreference diet included samples from1.02 lakhhouseholdsinIndia and found that whole grains were contributing significantly more calories than the EAT-Lancet recommendations, whereas the consumption of fruits, vegetables, legumes, meat, fish and eggs were much lower. Protein share was only 6-8per cent,compared tothe 29 per cent recommendation.These outcomes were independent of the socio-economic status of Indian households.Even the rich Indians werenot found to consume optimum amounts of fruits, vegetables, and proteins in their diet. In fact, an average Indian household consumesmore calories from processed foods than fruits. Authors concluded the average Indian diet as unhealthy, lacking essential food groups.

Another national-levelcross-sectional surveyin2017-18 bythe National NCD Monitoring Surveystudiedthe prevalence of risk factors in 12,000 Indianadults.Itrevealedthat32.8per cent of respondentsused tobacco, 15.9per centconsumed alcohol, 41.3per centwere not physically active, 98.4per centconsumed less thanfiveservings of fruits and vegetables per day. The study also reported an elevated risk of blood glucose and cardiovascular diseases among participants.

Also read: In Indias booming junk food market, there is little room for nutrition

Blue Zones, aconceptdeveloped by National Geographic Fellow and author Dan Buettner, are thefiveregions of the world where people live longer, lead physically and mentally healthy lives,and aremore active compared to the rest of the world. Tolive longer, the Blue Zones adoptednineevidence-based lifestyle modalities that arethought to slowthe ageing process, diet being one of the most importantcomponents.

The Blue zone diet is wholeandmostly plant-based.Ninety five per centof the daily Blue zone diet is composed of vegetables, fruits, whole grains, beans, legumes, nuts, olive oil, berries, oats, and barley. The diet recommends avoiding meat and dairy, sugary drinks, with no room for processed foods.

In contrast to the standard diet composition,Sardinia, one of five Blue Zones,followsa variation of the Mediterranean diet that includes all Blue Zone food groups along with moderate intake of fish and fewer intake of dairy, alcohol, and red meat.

Plant-based Blue Zone diets are rich in antioxidantsandanti-inflammatory polyphenols, which are reported topreventchronicillnessessuch as obesity, diabetes, cancer, and cardiovascular disease.

A 2015reviewby G.M. Pes and colleagues mapped historical evidence linked to male longevity among the Sardinian population and found that an inter-community nutrition transition to consuming more fruits and vegetablesandmoderate consumptions of meat led to significant health benefits to the ageing population by reducing mortality risk.

However, a wholesome, nutritious, antioxidant-rich diet isnt the only secret behind the Blue Zone longevity. Thepeopleliving therealso engagein high levels of physical activity, have low-stress levels, more social engagement, and a sense of well-being.

Eating like a Mediterranean is recommended as a part of longevity diet for the Indian population that includes more raw fruits and vegetables in salads; whole grains instead of polished rice; legumes, pulses, and beans in form of sprouts, salads, less spicy curry; healthy fats from nuts, seeds, olive oil, coconut, and avocado; along with limited intake of meat and sweets.

All processed foods like refined sugar, refined wheat flour, biscuits, instant noodlesshouldbe gradually eliminated from the daily diet.

Also read: Two-third Indians with non-communicable diseases fall in 26-59 age group, survey finds

Include these elements of the Mediterranean diet in your meals:

-Oats, barley, jowar, bajra, ragi, kodo millets, quinoa

-Dark green leafy vegetables like spinach, lettuce, drumstick leaves

-Nutslikealmonds, walnuts, figs

-Seedslikeflax, chia, pumpkin, sunflower, beans

-Legumeslikenavy beans, fava beans, chickpeas, lentils

-Dairyproducts likelow-fat cheese, yogurt, milk

-Fishlikesardines, salmon, trout, sea fishes

-Herbs and spiceslikemint, rosemary, sage, garlic, thyme, basil, and oregano.

To summarise, a vibrant, nutritious eating plan along with regular physical activity, sound sleep, and stress-free life is the key to acquiringa disease-free, long life.

Indians can start practising this one day at a time.

Dr Subhasree Ray is Doctoral Scholar (Ketogenic Diet), certified diabetes educator, and a clinical and public health nutritionist. She tweets @DrSubhasree. Views are personal.

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People are fascinated by the extremes of humanity, whether its going to the moon, how fast someone can run in the Olympics, or even how long someone can live,says Michael Pearce from the University of Washington (UW) in the U.S., who recently led a study that estimates with almost a 100% probability that the present record for maximum reported age at death 122 years, 164 days will be broken by 2100.

And with a continuous expansion in the world population, the likelihood of breaking records is only rising, the researchers believe.

Published in Demographic Research, their study assessed the extremes of human life by studying longevity records of more than a thousand people from 13 countries across the world, as well as of almost 14,000 individuals, who died between the ages of 105 and 109. Using statistical modeling to analyze the data, the researchers found that a lifespan of 125 years, or even 130 years, is possible in his century.

Basically, the researchers based their findings on two factors: how the risk of dying flattens after age 110, and growth in the number of people to reach age 110 this century, according to an article in The Conversation by Pierce and his co-author on the study, Adrian Raftery, who is a professor of statistics at UW.

Related on The Swaddle:

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On the one hand, life expectancy is on the rise globally due to advances in healthcare, and due to these same advancements, the researchers believe there is a flattening of the mortality rate after people reach a certain age someone who hits 110 has the almost same probability of living another year as someone reaches the age of 114.

This is a very select group of very robust people, Raftery explained, adding that if theyve gotten past all the various things life throws at you, such as disease, [then] they die for reasons that are somewhat independent of what affects younger people.

However, it may be pertinent to note, here, that the study is based on data gathered before the pandemic hit, and claimed more than 43 lakh lives globally. And, in any case, as the researchers clarified, the maximum is not the average, and just because we may break records by the end of the century, doesnt mean everyone or even most people will live to be 110.

A study from June had found that while we may live longer now, we cant really slow the process of aging in any manner. Our findings support the theory that, rather than slowing down death, more people are living much longer due to a reduction in mortality at younger ages, Jos Manuel Aburto, one of the studys co-authors from the Oxford University, had told The Guardian.

Yet another study from May had found that even if a person manages to avoid dying of heart disease, cancer, or road accidents, the human bodys structural and metabolic systems do fail beyond a point that lies between 120 to 150 years; making 150 years the absolute longest a human being can live.

Related on The Swaddle:

Scientists Say Gut Microbes May Reverse Aging Process in Human Brains

But so many studies on the subject of human lifespans beg the question: what drives our desire to live longer especially at a juncture when climate change is expected to make life difficult in myriad ways?

Experts believe it could be because we dont understand death. So the prospect of not living triggers a kind of FOMO. The quest to live forever, or to live for great expanses of time, has always been part of the human spirit The most difficult and inscrutable thing to us as mortal beings is our own death We dont understand it, we dont get it, and as meaning-laden beings, we cant fathom what it means to not exist, Paul Root Wolpe, an American sociologist and bioethicist, told Time.

As for people like Teslas Elon Musk and Googles co-founder Sergey Brindriving researchin increasing longevity to the point of, perhaps, being immortal, ego may be an important factor. Obviously they believe the world cant possibly survive without their existence, and so they think their immortality is so critical to the survival of the world, Ezekiel Emanuel, an oncologist and bioethicist, said.

Wolpe, however, notes that younger people have a harder time [dealing with the idea of dying] compared to older people. My youngest is upset that I do not want to be frozen and woken up in the future, Suzanne Moore, a columnist for The Guardian wrote last year.

According to Wolpe, older people dont care about living as long as younger people do because living longer doesnt make aging slower just as the study from June proved. What you see when you actually look at people at the end of life, to a large degree, is a sense of a life well-lived and a time for that life to transition itself, he notes.

Read more:
People's Lifespans May Increase In the Future. Why Do They Desire Longer Lives? - The Swaddle

When Jeanne Calment of France died in 1997 at the age of 122 years and 164 days, she set a record for oldest human. That record still stands.

As statisticians who study demography, we expect that record will be broken by 2100.

We study the maximum human life span using a data-driven approach. Our peer-reviewed study, published in June 2021, models and combines two key components: how the risk of dying flattens after age 110, and growth in the number of people to reach age 110 this century.

Our analysis of these two factors, which we did before the COVID-19 pandemic, suggests its nearly inevitable that someone will break Calments record during the 21st century, with an 89% chance that someone will live to at least 126, but only a 3% chance that someone will reach age 132.

The debate

Scientists are actively debating whether there is a fixed limit to the human life span.

Some biologists think the data shows that aging is not a disease that can be treated, but instead an inevitable process that cannot be fully stopped, whether through medical breakthroughs or other means. Some demographers have argued that there is a natural limit to life expectancy, implying that maximum ages will level off as well.

But others think theres good evidence that life spans will continue to lengthen - at least for a lucky few. Several prominent biologists and medical experts have recently published findings suggesting there is some hope for extending life spans dramatically via medical interventions. Ultrawealthy tech titans like Teslas Elon Musk and Google co-founder Sergey Brin are investing heavily in such research.

In 2002, two demographers named Jim Oeppen and James Vaupel observed that between 1928 and 1990, limits to life expectancy proposed by leading demographers were broken just five years after the prediction on average. They also noted that flattening gains to life expectancy should not determine our view of maximum life span, as they are quite different things the maximum is not the average.

Even a pair of prominent demographers who come down on the side of a fixed limit to human life, S. Jay Olshansky and Bruce A. Carnes, acknowledged that there is no age at which death is absolutely certain, leaving open the possibility of continually broken life span records.

Supercentenarians

Data on supercentenarians, or those who reach age 110, are limited and often of poor quality. There is the problem of age-attainment bias, or the tendency of very old individuals to misstate or exaggerate their age. For this reason, weve used only data from the International Database on Longevity, a collection of rigorously verified death records for supercentenarians.

Since these individuals died before 2020, they were all born no later than 1910. Because of record-keeping limitations throughout the world at that time, only records from 13 countries could be included in the database. For that reason, our study is limited to individuals from those 13 countries.

Basic demography

Yearly mortality rates generally increase as people age. For example, individuals are more likely to die at age 80 than age 20.

But this changes for those who make it to 110 years old. The best available data suggests that mortality rates for these supercentenarians, while high, do not increase as they continue to age. In a sense, this means that supercentenarians stop aging.

Instead, supercentenarians as a group have a steady but very high mortality rate of about 50% per year. This means that for every 1,000 individuals who have reached age 110, we expect approximately 500 of them will have died before their 111th birthday, and 250 more by age 112. Taken to its logical end point, this pattern suggests only 1 of the 1,000 would reach age 120, and only 1 in a million supercentenarians would reach age 130.

Even more, such traditional demographic factors as sex and nationality that affect mortality rates also appear to not affect supercentenarians. But scientists have yet to figure out what factors lead supercentenarians to live as long as they do. Do they benefit from excellent genetics? Or healthy environments? Or some other factor as yet unidentified? They appear to be extraordinary individuals, but the exact reason is unclear.

That pattern led us to the second component of our study: projecting how many people will reach age 110 during the 21st century, which ends in the year 2100. Using population forecasting methods developed by our research group that are used by the United Nations, we found that large mid-20th-century population growth will likely lead to an orders-of-magnitude increase in the supercentenarian population by 2100. Our estimates suggest that about 300,000 people will reach age 110 by 2080, give or take about 100,000. Although this range is well below a million, it makes the one-in-a-million chance that at least one of them will reach age 130 a real possibility.

Practical limits

Predicting the extremes of humanity is a challenging task filled with unknowns. Just as its conceivable that a medical breakthrough could let humans live indefinitely, every individual to reach age 123 could simply die the next day. Instead, our study has taken a statistical, data-driven approach focused on what will be observed this century rather than on untestable hypotheses about absolute limits to life span. Our results indicate theres only a 13% chance any individual will reach age 130, and a very tiny chance anyone lives to age 135 this century.

In other words, the data suggests that life span may not have a hard limit, but a practical one. Humans will almost certainly break Calments record of 122 this century, but probably not by more than a decade.

While we carried out our analysis using data collected before the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic and its impact on life expectancy, we believe our overall findings remain accurate. The pandemic may lead to a somewhat smaller total number of 21st-century supercentenarians. But that reduction is unlikely to be very large, and any big effect on their mortality past 110 is unlikely to last many years into the future.

Originally posted here:
Life spans will likely increase this century - Jacksonville Journal-Courier