You can't jump higher than the ceiling

Humanity has reached the ceiling of maximum life expectancy

Julia Korovsky, XX2 CENTURY, based on EurekAlert: Maximum human lifespan has already been reached, Einstein researchers conclude.

People have reached the limit of maximum life expectancy – this is the conclusion reached by scientists of the Albert Einstein College of Medicine. The results of the study are published in the journal Nature (Dong et al., Evidence for a limit to human lifespan – VM).

Since the 19th century, the average life expectancy has been constantly increasing – this was facilitated by the development of healthcare, nutrition and other factors. On average, Americans born this year can live to 79 years old – in 1900 they could only count on 47. Over the past forty years, the maximum life expectancy has also increased. But scientists are sure that humanity is running into the limits of what is possible. "Demographicists and biologists say: there is no reason to believe that the current increase in maximum life expectancy will end soon," says the study's lead author, Dr. Jan Vijg. "But our data indicate that we reached the limit back in the 90s."

The researchers analyzed the information of the Human Mortality Database, which contains demographic data on residents of more than 40 states. Since 1900, there has been a decrease in mortality among the elderly in these countries. With each calendar year, the number of those who lived to an advanced age (70 years and older) increased in each age group, which indicates a constant increase in average life expectancy. But when researchers analyzed the survival rate of people over a hundred years old for the period from 1900 to the present, they found that its peak growth occurs at the age of about a hundred years and then decreases rapidly, regardless of the year of birth.

Then the scientists examined the information about the maximum age at the time of death obtained from the International Database on Longevity. They drew attention to people from the countries with the largest number of centenarians (USA, France, Japan, Great Britain), who turned over 110 years old in 1968-2006. In the 70-90s, the age of centenarians at the time of death increased rapidly, but by 1995 the growth stopped – and this is another proof that life expectancy has reached its limit.

Based on data on the maximum age at death, the researchers calculated that the average maximum life expectancy is 115 years – although some overcome this barrier and live longer. Researchers recognized 125 years as the absolute limit of human life. This means that in each particular year, the probability of finding a person who has lived to 125 years is less than 1 in 10,000.

"Successes in the fight against infectious and chronic diseases can increase the average, but not the maximum life expectancy," says Veig. – Although potentially breakthroughs in treatment can increase life expectancy and take it beyond the limits we calculated, for this they must be so significant as to overpower genetic variants, the totality of which, apparently,, defines the life span. I think the resources that are currently being spent on increasing life expectancy should be directed to improving health in old age and increasing the number of healthy years of life."

Portal "Eternal youth" http://vechnayamolodost.ru  06.10.2016