GENES MAY BE LESS IMPORTANT IN DETERMINING YOUR LONGEVITY
By Lee Degenstein
I woke up in a pretty good mood last Thursday morning, that is until I opened up the New York Times. No, I wasn’t looking at the editorial section but rather the health and science section. It was there that this new day suddenly took a sharp turn for the worse. The lead article was entitled, “Live Long? Die Young? The Answer Isn’t Just In Genes”. More on that thought in a moment.
When we were kids we thought we would live forever, remember? The reality of life changed all of that as we grew older and presumably wiser. Nonetheless, my family has a pretty good gene pool. As I have mentioned previously in this column, members of my family seem to live for a long time, mostly to annoy the other members of the family.
My grandmother and grandfather on my mother’s side lived until 94 and 92 respectively. My Grandmother on my father’s side lived until she was 95. My father’s dad lived until he was only 45, but no one liked him very much anyway. My father lived until he was 96, his brother until 92 and my mother lived until she was 80. Not bad right?
So at least until Thursday morning I had every right to believe that I would be around for a while because as the saying goes, “I came from good genes”. The New York Times article may have put a damper on that theory.
About 30 years ago most experts, and for that matter non experts, believed that a good environment had a lot to do with how long you’re your stay on this planet would be. In other words, assuming you weren’t a crab fisherman on the Bering Sea, if you had a good diet, exercised regularly, didn’t eat fatty foods and didn’t smoke, you increased your chances of a longer life Of courser common sense tells us that most of those long held beliefs are still true today.
More recently however, science has changed its mind. Are you surprised? The experts told us that if other family members lived a long time, then there was a decent shot we would stick around for a long time ourselves. This of course means that you have to avoid stepping under a bus, at least prematurely.
Somewhere in the back of my mind I always justified having that extra large piece of red meat, an extra cigar every now and then, or skipping my workout if it looked like rain (I workout indoors). The reason was simple enough, everyone in my family seemed to live so long and therefore my family gene pool must be quite good. So a little cheating wouldn’t kill me – literally!
According to The National Center For Health Studies, people are living longer these days for a variety of reasons. We are eating healthier foods, we have better medicine, we exercise and most of us don’t smoke. The most recent figures from the Center indicate that men on average live until they are 68.5 years old and women live an average of 76.1 years. By the way, what are you ladies doing to us and what are you doing after we are gone, other than celebrating that is!
Well wouldn’t you know it, by the time everyone was relying on their family genes science has changed it mind once again! Are you surprised? When are these guys going to get it right?
According to Dr. James W. Vaupel, who directs the Laboratory of Survival and Longevity at the Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research in Rostock, Germany, says that “Life spans are nothing like a trait like height which is strongly inherited.”
Vaupel told reporters that his research showed that, “Your really learn very little about your own life span from the life spans of your parents” His studies concluded that how tall your parents are, compared with the average height, explains about 80 to 90 percent of how tall you are, compared to the average person. However, only three percent of how long you live compared to the average person can be explained by how long your parents lived.
In an interview with the New York Times, Vaupel said that twins, even identical twins, die at different times. The statistics indicate that twins usually die on average more than 10 years apart. The bottom line, he said, “is that old people can be struck down for several reasons or no reason at all. Some older people are more vulnerable than others and overall, it’s clear that the more fragile tend to die first. Yet for some reason there are those among the fragile that seem to continue to live on. Then again there are seemingly healthy people who just die suddenly.” Another study recently conducted in Switzerland seemed to bare these findings out.
Today, science and aging experts seem to be turning back to the long held belief that environment, exercise, diet, and vocation seem in most cases, to determine how long we will live rather than mom and dad’s lifespan. In other words, it’s what we do not what we came from that seems to make the difference in life expectancy.
Are you confused yet? My head is spinning from all these changes I feel like I’m watching a bad ping pong match, back and forth and back and forth. Is this the last time you science guys are going to change your minds on this one? Three strikes and you’re out!
As a result of these latest findings, it may be time for me to make some mid life corrections. Just in case science has gotten it right this time, here’s my plan for longevity. No more eating cheese steaks while parachuting. I won’t smoke in the shower. I will only cross the street when the light is green. I will only eat red meat on days of the week ending in the letter “Y” Yes, I am feeling better about my future prospects already.
I have to go now. My deadline for filing stories with my editor is Sunday morning at the latest. Today is Thursday and I have decided to get my story in early this week, just in case I am suddenly not around. I hope to be back next week, no thanks to my family’s genes!
© copyright 2006, Lee Degenstein.
All rights reserved.
I woke up in a pretty good mood last Thursday morning, that is until I opened up the New York Times. No, I wasn’t looking at the editorial section but rather the health and science section. It was there that this new day suddenly took a sharp turn for the worse. The lead article was entitled, “Live Long? Die Young? The Answer Isn’t Just In Genes”. More on that thought in a moment.
When we were kids we thought we would live forever, remember? The reality of life changed all of that as we grew older and presumably wiser. Nonetheless, my family has a pretty good gene pool. As I have mentioned previously in this column, members of my family seem to live for a long time, mostly to annoy the other members of the family.
My grandmother and grandfather on my mother’s side lived until 94 and 92 respectively. My Grandmother on my father’s side lived until she was 95. My father’s dad lived until he was only 45, but no one liked him very much anyway. My father lived until he was 96, his brother until 92 and my mother lived until she was 80. Not bad right?
So at least until Thursday morning I had every right to believe that I would be around for a while because as the saying goes, “I came from good genes”. The New York Times article may have put a damper on that theory.
About 30 years ago most experts, and for that matter non experts, believed that a good environment had a lot to do with how long you’re your stay on this planet would be. In other words, assuming you weren’t a crab fisherman on the Bering Sea, if you had a good diet, exercised regularly, didn’t eat fatty foods and didn’t smoke, you increased your chances of a longer life Of courser common sense tells us that most of those long held beliefs are still true today.
More recently however, science has changed its mind. Are you surprised? The experts told us that if other family members lived a long time, then there was a decent shot we would stick around for a long time ourselves. This of course means that you have to avoid stepping under a bus, at least prematurely.
Somewhere in the back of my mind I always justified having that extra large piece of red meat, an extra cigar every now and then, or skipping my workout if it looked like rain (I workout indoors). The reason was simple enough, everyone in my family seemed to live so long and therefore my family gene pool must be quite good. So a little cheating wouldn’t kill me – literally!
According to The National Center For Health Studies, people are living longer these days for a variety of reasons. We are eating healthier foods, we have better medicine, we exercise and most of us don’t smoke. The most recent figures from the Center indicate that men on average live until they are 68.5 years old and women live an average of 76.1 years. By the way, what are you ladies doing to us and what are you doing after we are gone, other than celebrating that is!
Well wouldn’t you know it, by the time everyone was relying on their family genes science has changed it mind once again! Are you surprised? When are these guys going to get it right?
According to Dr. James W. Vaupel, who directs the Laboratory of Survival and Longevity at the Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research in Rostock, Germany, says that “Life spans are nothing like a trait like height which is strongly inherited.”
Vaupel told reporters that his research showed that, “Your really learn very little about your own life span from the life spans of your parents” His studies concluded that how tall your parents are, compared with the average height, explains about 80 to 90 percent of how tall you are, compared to the average person. However, only three percent of how long you live compared to the average person can be explained by how long your parents lived.
In an interview with the New York Times, Vaupel said that twins, even identical twins, die at different times. The statistics indicate that twins usually die on average more than 10 years apart. The bottom line, he said, “is that old people can be struck down for several reasons or no reason at all. Some older people are more vulnerable than others and overall, it’s clear that the more fragile tend to die first. Yet for some reason there are those among the fragile that seem to continue to live on. Then again there are seemingly healthy people who just die suddenly.” Another study recently conducted in Switzerland seemed to bare these findings out.
Today, science and aging experts seem to be turning back to the long held belief that environment, exercise, diet, and vocation seem in most cases, to determine how long we will live rather than mom and dad’s lifespan. In other words, it’s what we do not what we came from that seems to make the difference in life expectancy.
Are you confused yet? My head is spinning from all these changes I feel like I’m watching a bad ping pong match, back and forth and back and forth. Is this the last time you science guys are going to change your minds on this one? Three strikes and you’re out!
As a result of these latest findings, it may be time for me to make some mid life corrections. Just in case science has gotten it right this time, here’s my plan for longevity. No more eating cheese steaks while parachuting. I won’t smoke in the shower. I will only cross the street when the light is green. I will only eat red meat on days of the week ending in the letter “Y” Yes, I am feeling better about my future prospects already.
I have to go now. My deadline for filing stories with my editor is Sunday morning at the latest. Today is Thursday and I have decided to get my story in early this week, just in case I am suddenly not around. I hope to be back next week, no thanks to my family’s genes!
© copyright 2006, Lee Degenstein.
All rights reserved.
posted by Lee Degenstein | 6:40 AM
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