22 May 2022 21Why? Because, on average,
people who take them die
earlier. It seems they are more
prone to certain cancers.
You might want to avoid
popping multivitamins too.
People who take them also
seem to die earlier, at least
on average. The iron found in
most supplements might be
behind this weird effect. Iron,
Brendborg says, “works
almost like fertiliser for the
growth of bacteria”. This
could also explain why blood
donors tend to live longer.
Donors get rid of excess iron.
Giving blood is also a
form of what Brendborg sees
as the master key to fighting
ageing: hormesis. No, I’d
never heard of it either, but
it essentially means making
the system stronger by
repeatedly challenging it in
small ways. Losing blood is
one way to challenge the
system. Radiation is another
— which might explain why,
in the US, radiologists tend to
live longer than other doctors.
Yet another is eating your
five-a-day. Polyphenols, the
much-praised micronutrientsin so much of our fruit and
veg, are in fact ever so slightly
toxic. And in the right dose, it
seems, that is good for us.
Polyphenols aside,
Brendborg is refreshingly
sceptical about dietary advice.
With the exception of fibre
and garlic, which he singles
out for their ability to lower
“bad” LDL cholesterol, he
says that claims about
superfoods “are almost always
false”, or based on doses that
you could not safely replicate
in a diet. He even has doubts
about the much-toutedbenefits of red wine and
omega-3 fish oils. Their
apparent impact on lifespan
could just reflect the fact that
wealthy people love a nice
piece of salmon and a good
claret. And wealthy people
live longer.
Another false claim, or at
least a false belief, is that your
genes have a big influence on
your lifespan. But grandma
living to 103, or whatever,
turns out to be all but
irrelevant. Biologists measure
how “heritable” a trait is on a
scale from zero (it’s all aboutthe environment) to one (it’s
all in the genes). Longevity
scores below 0.1. Married
couples have more similar
lifespans, apparently, than
brothers and sisters.
On the plus side, all this
strongly suggests that what
you do and how you live
makes all the difference.
Living at high altitudes seems
to help, perhaps because of
the lower oxygen and higher
radiation levels — more of
that hormesis.
Vaccination definitely
helps. Quite apart from the
direct health benefits — not
dying of disease, that is, and
spreading less of it around —
having jabs could explain
why people look younger
for their age than they used
to. They have had to fight
fewer system-ageing
infections. New jabs might
bring new benefits.
Brendborg reports on some
exciting research into
common viruses such as
cytomegalovirus, or CMV.
Most of us have this without
knowing it — and without
knowing that it is accelerating
ageing. We may not have
symptoms, but our immune
systems are still exhausting
themselves fighting CMV.
If you really want to
improve your chances,
though, Brendborg suggests
taking a drug that, according
to one study, made recipients
80 per cent less likely to die
young when given in high
doses. The drug? Exercise.
He is particularly keen on
high-intensity interval
training, where bursts of
activity alternate with short
rests, allowing you to exert
yourself more, albeit in
smaller doses.
Yet he recommends
ordinary exercise too — and
weightlifting. By the age of 80
we lose about half of our
muscle mass, on average.
Lifting weights — of
appropriate sizes — is the best
way to fight muscle loss, and it
also slows down the inevitable
decrease in our bone density
as we age — a particular risk
for older women.
Exercise works right down
to the cellular level, even
stimulating the microscopic
mitochondria that provide
the chemical energy within
each of our cells. Swimming
in cold water has the
same effect.
“The secret to a long life is
not to live without difficult
times,” he says, “but to be
able to withstand the
onslaught.” Wise words —
from a wise book. c