“Old age is not negative”

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How slow aging and the search for a formula for healthy longevity is one of the points on which hundreds of studies have been based over the years, involving the best experts to achieve the keys that allow us to live longer and better. Spain is one of the oldest countries in the world and Life expectancy is expected to reach 86 years in 2040.overtaking Japan, the country with which a summit was held in Salamanca a few weeks ago to talk about longevity.

Ana Maria Cuervo, co-director of the Einstein Institute in New York: “A lot can be done to slow down the aging process”

Healthy Aging

Among the experts present at the summit were Ana Maria Cuervo, co-director of the Einstein Institute for Aging Research in New York. Cuervo believes that in 30 years we will live a “healthy old age”. Every time we know that prevention is possible and that it can happen. So, the ideal is that when you reach 40 or 50 years of age, you go to a doctor and he or she will give you a series of tips based on your own physiology and condition. It is clear that something can be done to slow down the aging process,” he told Informativos Telecinco.

Aging has two parts. On the one hand, this is the stage of life at which progressive deterioration and loss of function, but if not for this This would be the best stage of life: You’re no longer working, your kids have flown the nest, and you have a lot of life experience. However, the increased likelihood of developing the disease reduces the quality of life.

What is geroscience?

For more than ten years, as Ana Maria Cuervo explains in an interview with El País, together with her team she has created a new discipline called genetics, so they thought about how to approach the aging process differently, limiting it, without waiting for the disease to occur to treat it. “Old age is like a disease that has not yet manifested itself, but If you don’t do anything, it will show.”he claims.

The expert argues that the world’s population is aging, and that is why we must focus on geriatrics to be able to “convey a positive message, “Old age is not negative”.

Anti-aging drugs?

In his interview with El País, he also emphasizes that trials are being carried out on existing drugs, one of which metformin, used in patients with diabetes, it has been observed that those who take it age slower. “This drug improves all markers of aging: autophagy, mitochondria, epigenetics… this still needs to be experienced. But maybe in the future, at 40 or 50 years old, a doctor will start prescribing it to avoid aging,” he says.