When I was younger, about ten years old, I realised that everyone ages and dies. And I thought well why should that be? Can’t we do something about it? I then thought I’d do it. I’ll study ageing and figure…
In the time that it will take you to read this article, millions of your body’s cells will have died via a self-destruct mechanism known as programmed cell death. This process is part of your body’s normal…
Warren Sanderson, Stony Brook University (The State University of New York) et Sergei Scherbov, International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA)
The idea of raising the retirement age is not popular – most people resent being told they must work for longer. But with life expectancies increasing and people enjoying higher quality of life at older…
Arguments with the people we are close to can have a serious impact on our health and mortality rate, a new study has confirmed. The link between having supportive friends and family and serious health…
Loneliness in older people is a serious issue but when I visited HenPower, a lottery-funded project in the north east that puts older people and hens together, I admit I had been expecting another worthy…
Stories about “population ageing” often have a number of things in common – it is bad, it is new, and it will overwhelm us all. The major fear is a burden of cost and caring that more older people will…
If you follow the debate on “population ageing” you could be forgiven for thinking that it is a bad thing; growing numbers of older people mean greying societies, struggling to maintain pensions, welfare…
As many as 500 brain scans are performed in Scotland every week. These scans are mostly used to diagnose - or rule out - serious diseases like strokes and tumours, but this is not their only function…
We really should have seen the crisis coming. It isn’t as if older people are a forgotten minority. Most of us, whether or not we are old, interact with people who are on a daily basis. And much of our…
Older motorcycle riders are up to three times as likely to be seriously injured in a crash as young adults, according to new research from Brown University in the US. The study, published in the journal…
When an older driver has a crash with tragic consequences, there are calls for stricter licensing controls to detect “unfit” drivers and take their licences away, typically focusing on those aged 75 or…
The notion of walking backwards into the future describes the value we can derive from remembering and understanding our past, in order to best prepare for a better tomorrow. We can’t do this without properly…
Ageing is the sum of many processes acting in concert to produce the signs and symptoms we know as “getting old”. Of course, there’s no way to stop the ageing process, but a better understanding of the…
At the turn of the 20th century, life expectancy in Australia was just 55 years for men and 59 for women. Thanks to medical breakthroughs and technological advances, the average Australian woman can now…
Over the past century life expectancy has increased dramatically and older citizens around the globe will soon outnumber children. By 2050, nearly one out of every four people will be older than 60 years…
The demographic profile of the world is changing. Ageing is a global phenomenon, an unprecedented, pervasive, profound and an enduring process for humanity. The current and future burden and opportunities…