Living Life to the Fullest...and Longer?

We all dream of living life to the fullest, and eventually passing on at an impressive old age. We all try to do our best to be healthy and live life without having to worry about the possible diseases, illnesses, or health problems that may come our way. Let’s admit it. Most of us want to live until we’re 100, before having to prepare for our wills to be read. Well, a new surprising study proves that "72 is the new 30", since the death rate has decreased in industrialized countries in the recent centuries.

On October 16, 2012, author Charles Q. Choi’s article,“"Seventy-two Is the New 30": Why Are We Living So Much Longer?” was published for National Geographic News. In the article, Choi explains the many questions that scientists are trying to solve to find out why the death rate has fallen so dramatically in the recent hundred years. What’s different about us now, from the days of our ape ancestors? Are changes in our lifestyles the factors of long life, or genetic mutations? Before coming up with these questions, scientists were able to observe the fact that nowadays, humans survive much longer than our closest living relatives, chimpanzees, which usually do not live past 50. Even hunter-gatherers have twice the life expectancy at birth as wild chimpanzees, even though they often lack the advanced nutrition.

To find out the story behind how we got to this incredible state, the study team compared death rates in industrialized countries with those in modern-day hunter-gatherer groups, whose lifestyles more closely reflect those of early modern humans. After making observations, the researchers noticed that the mortality rate during the first few decades of life in the industrialized world, (meaning well-developed in terms of clean water, education, medication, and people with higher life expectancies) is now 200 times lower overall in comparison to the hunter-gatherer groups of today.

 

 Study leader, Oskar Burger, an evolutionary anthropologist at the Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research in Germany says, "We have a greater distance in mortality levels between today's lowest-mortality nations and hunter-gatherers than there is between hunter-gatherers and chimpanzees." To specify, when talking about  human longevity, the recent shift to modern living dramatically outweighs the advanced and improved changes that have accumulated over thousands of years. For instance, according to the study, most of the major transformations in mortality rates took place between now and about 1900; only around 4 or so of the 8,000 human generations that have ever existed.

These improvements are obviously most likely the effects of lifestyle changes, rather than any genetic adaptation of species. We still do not have enough information to explain why human lifespan is so susceptible to industrialization. Biologist Caleb Finch of the University of Southern California, who did not take part in this study, believes that the research done in the future should do a better job helping us understand how changes in environment and lifestyle have resulted in these remarkable increases in life span. Finch tells us that no matter what the future hold in terms of investigations, we should not assume that we will always live longer. Negative factors, such as global-obesity and environmental issues throughout the world could possible raise the mortality rate in the upcoming years. At the end of the day, we shouldn’t expect the wrinkles, joint pains, and illnesses to diminish because of this study, but instead try to make positive health choices that will help us reach that prime “100”.

This article was very interesting to read. I have always wondered about the factors that were behind high and low mortality rates and knew that health choices and lifestyles was one of the factors. In other words, it is obvious that people who have access to healthy food, clean water, clothing, shelter, and medical support live longer than people who lack any of these survival necessities.  Although, I found it fascinating that the recent studies showed that there were  “two hundred or more times lower mortality at ages 10 to 20”, then ages out of that specific range. That is certainly a dramatic difference. I am interested to learn whether males or females have a lower mortality rate, in the future. I realize that mortality rates don’t stay constant, but evolve with time and biological changes.  I remember doing a project in 7^th grade Geography, where we had to compare the two countries Kuwait and Qatar in terms of occupations, government, environment, education, economy, and life expectancy. Compared to Kuwait, the overall average life expectancy of Kuwait was lower than that of Qatar. Now, I understand that Kuwait’s poorer economy and environment may have led its life expectancy to be slightly lower than Qatar’s.

 

Although we haven’t specifically addressed nor discussed human culture and development in our Honors Biology class, I do remember us talking briefly about the fact that as we grow older, our cells begin to damage. For example, we tend to lack collagen and elastin in our skin cells, and we get wrinkles. Also, the pigment cells in our hair follicles die when we get very old, which is why we see some older women try to schedule appointments at their local beauty salon A.S.A.P for color treatments. I really enjoyed reading this article, because it enabled me to make some connections from other things in the past that I’ve learned. I hope to learn more about anthropology and its connections to biology in the future!

Article Link: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2012/10/121016-72-is-new-30-burger-longevity-science-evolution/?source=hp_dl1_news_longevity20121017 

 

Image Citation:

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