On December 14, 2016, the UK-based magazine The Spectator published a column by AFAR Board member S. Jay Olshansky, PhD, “Centenarians smoke, drink and eat badly. How do they get away with it?”
An expert on the socioeconomic impact of living healthier longer--the longevity dividend--Olshansky observes the discrepancies among centenarian’s lifestyle choices like diet, exercise, and smoking. He turns to the role of genetics in longevity for some individuals.
Olshansky concludes:
“The take-home message on the secret to longevity is therefore surprisingly simple. Adopt a healthy lifestyle early to maximise your longevity potential; time will reveal to you whether you belong to a long-lived subgroup of the population; and, by the time you reach the age when you know the answer to this question, you’ll already be old enough to know that most of what you thought you knew about human ageing is probably wrong.”
Read the entire article here.
S. Jay Olshansky, PhD, is a Professor in the School of Public Health at the University of Illinois at Chicago and Research Associate at the Center on Aging at the University of Chicago and at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Learn more about Dr. Olshansky’s work and accomplishments here.
In AFAR’s expert-edited InfoAging guides, learn more about theories of Longevity and explore the effects of smoking, alcohol, and nutrition in our Healthy Aging center here.
