Longevity is a big issue for the Switched ON community. Our philosophy is all about creating a lifestyle for ourselves where we enjoy decades of healthy living after retirement.
Yes, decades! And it’s discoveries from scientists such as David Sinclair AO that will make ‘decades’ a reality. Dr Sinclair is a biologist and professor of genetics at Harvard University.
He’s also one of the world’s leading researchers on the study of longevity and what he says is this interview with Lewis Howes is truly astounding.
Geneticists have known for some time that a combination of diet and lifestyle can add decades – there’s that word again, decades – to human longevity. But according to Dr Sinclair, it may be possible not only to arrest but to reverse the cellular damage that causes ageing.
That’s it, one day – hopefully soon – we’ll be able to press the rewind button on ageing.
As Dr Sinclair says, genetics knowledge is growing exponentially and the possibility of reversing ageing is the very latest research from his lab. Sometime in the next several years, humans may have access to a pill that does to their bodies what Dr Sinclair has been able to do with the eyesight of ageing mice.
In the interview, Lewis Howes asks several pertinent questions, and while Dr Sinclair’s answers are heavy with technical information, there are some clear takeaways for us to learn and build into our lifestyles.
The most important is that ageing causes diseases, and not the other way around. It’s the very fact that we age and that vital cells become less effective that is the harbinger of fatal diseases and viruses. We accumulate inflammation and loose immune cells as we age, making our immune system less resilient.
As an aside, for any ‘anti-vaxxers’out there, Dr Sinclair says 98% of scientists support the use of vaccines to fight COVID-19 and that vaccines don’tcause autism.
The other essential idea we have to understand is that when we speak about longevity, we’re talking about extending the number of good years we have when we’re healthy and vital, and not simply tacking on extra time when we’re already decrepit and confined to a nursing home.
Dr Sinclair doesn’t offer a strict longevity recipe, rather many of his suggestions are supported by other researchers we at Switched ON Living greatly admire, such as Dr Michael Mosley.
Most famously, this includes intermittent fasting and cutting out as much sugar as possible, even from staples likes apples. The key for fruits is to enjoy those with elevated polyphenols.
His best blueprint for living comes when he uses the example of Okinawa and lists the characteristics that have a made it a longevity hotspot – people typically stop eating when they reach 70% satiated, they eat lots of vegetables, there’s no packaged food, they enjoy lots of physical activity and have strong social networks.
As Dr Sinclair says, a good life is also the recipe for a longer life.
For those of us who would like to know more, there’s plenty more information available on YouTube, or we can read Dr Sinclair’s book, Lifespan: Why We Age – and Why We Don’t Have To
https://www.amazon.com/Lifespan-Why-Age-Dont-Have-ebook/dp/B07N4C6LGR
