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NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – Getting a bit more calcium in your diet could help you live longer, new research suggests. Swedish researchers found that men who consumed the most calcium in food were 25 percent less likely to die over the next decade than their peers who took in the least calcium from food. None of the men took calcium supplements. The findings are in line with previous research linking higher calcium intake with lower mortality in both men and women, the researchers point out in a report in the American Journal of Epidemiology. While many researchers have looked...

WESTMORELAND, N.H. (AP) -- Two of the oldest people in the world have died on the same day, one in New Hampshire and one in Michigan. Mary Josephine Ray was certified as the oldest person living in the United States. Her granddaughter Katherine Ray says she died in a Westmoreland, N.H., nursing home Sunday at 114 years, 294 days. The Gerontology Research Group says Daisey Bailey died in Detroit hours later at 113 years, 342 days. The group tracks and studies old people and certifies those 110 or older, called supercentenarians.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - People with fat in their thighs and backsides may live longer because the fat traps harmful fatty particles and actively secretes helpful compounds, according to a report published on Tuesday. Many studies have shown that people who accumulate fat around the abdomen and stomach are more likely to die of heart disease and other causes than bottom-heavy people, but the reasons are not clear. This may be because several different mechanisms are involved, said Konstantinos Manolopoulos of Britain's University of Oxford. "It is the protective role of lower body, that is, gluteofemoral fat, that is striking," Manolopoulos...

Can you really be bored to death? ...experts say there's a possibility that the more bored you are, the more likely you are to die early.

You really can be bored to death, scientists discover Tedium: People with dull jobs must find outside interests, experts warn Boredom could be shaving years off your life, scientists have found. Researchers say that people who complain of boredom are more likely to die young, and that those who experienced 'high levels' of tedium are more than two-and-a-half times as likely to die from heart disease or stroke than those satisfied with their lot. More than 7,000 civil servants were studied over 25 years - and those who said they were bored were nearly 40 per cent more likely to...

A PILL to help people live to 100 free from debilitating health problems is set to "revolutionise" ageing, experts said yesterday. The breakthrough has come after scientists identified three “super-genes”. People born with the genes are 20 times more likely to reach a century – and 80 per cent less likely to develop the senility disease Alzheimer’s. Even being overweight or a heavy smoker does not stop a third of those with the genes living to 100. Now US researchers are working to produce a drug that can mimic the genetic benefits and hope it will be ready for testing...

People who carry a few extra pounds after age 70 tend to live longer than people who don’t, new research finds. Overweight older adults who took part in the Australian study had a clear survival advantage over those who were normal weight, underweight, or obese. The findings suggest that the widely accepted body mass index (BMI) weight guidelines may not be particularly useful after age 70, lead researcher Leon Flicker, PhD, of the University of Western Australia tells WebMD. Last summer, researchers in Canada reported the same findings after analyzing data from more than 11,000 adults followed for more than...

Lounging in front of the tube not only eats up hours in your day, it may also shorten your life, according to a new study. The study, which looked at the connection between watching TV and death for 8,800 Australian adults, found that each hour of TV-viewing was associated with an 11 percent increased risk of death from any cause, and an 18 percent increased risk of death from cardiovascular disease. These findings held true even after the researchers took into account other factors that could raise the risk of dying, such as age, gender, waist circumference and exercise habits....

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), the United States ranked 29th in the world in 2006 in life expectancy at age 50. That places it more than three years behind the world's leader, Japan, and more than one and a half years behind Australia, Canada, France, Italy, Iceland, Spain, and Switzerland. About 4 million Americans reach the age of 50 each year, so an average loss of one and a half years per person means an aggregate loss of some 6 million years of potential life, valued at anywhere from $600 billion to $1.3 trillion annually. In 2007, the...

Long life may stem from a proper imbalance of dietary nutrients. A new study in fruit flies suggests that the life-extending properties of caloric restriction may be due not only to fewer calories in the diet, but also to just the right mix of protein building blocks, called amino acids. The study, published online December 2 in Nature, may help explain some of the health benefits of restricted-calorie diets. Coupled with other data, the new study should prompt researchers to reevaluate whether it is calorie count or the nutrient composition of a diet that is most important for regulating lifespan...

(BRONX, NY) — A team led by researchers at Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University has found a clear link between living to 100 and inheriting a hyperactive version of an enzyme that rebuilds telomeres — the tip ends of chromosomes. The findings appear in the latest issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Telomeres play crucial roles in aging, cancer and other biological processes. Their importance was recognized last month, when three scientists were awarded the 2009 Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine for determining the structure of telomeres and discovering how they protect...

Scientists have shown that feeding a simple polyamine called spermidine to worms, fruit flies and yeast significantly prolongs their lifespan. In addition, adding spermidine to the diet of mice decreased molecular markers of ageing, and when human immune cells were cultured in a medium containing spermidine, they also lived for longer.Spermidine - a simple linear molecule found in large quantities in human sperm and grapefruit - is known to be necessary for cell growth and maturation, and as cells age their level of spermidine is know to fall. Now, Frank Madeo from the University of Graz in Austria and his colleagues have shown...

So what does the world's oldest man eat? The answer is not much, at least not too much. Walter Breuning, who turned 113 on Monday, eats just two meals a day and has done so for the past 35 years. "I think you should push back from the table when you're still hungry," Breuning said. At 5 foot 8, ("I shrunk a little," he admitted) and 125 pounds, Breuning limits himself to a big breakfast and lunch every day and no supper. "I have weighed the same for about 35 years," Breuning said. "Well, that's the way it should be."...

Reliapundit alerts us to breaking news: Gertrude Baines, who lived to be the world's oldest person on a steady diet of crispy bacon, fried chicken and ice cream, died Friday at a nursing home. She was 115. Baines, who remarked last year that she enjoyed life so much she wouldn't mind living another 100 years, died in her sleep, said Emma Camanag, administrator at Western Convalescent Hospital. The centenarian likely suffered a heart attack, said her longtime physician, Dr. Charles Witt. An autopsy was scheduled to determine the cause of death. ...Staff at Baines' nursing home described her as a...

Is it really possible for anyone to live happily to 100? The good news is that your body was designed to be 100 - you just have to get out of the way. Getting out of the way means taking an honest look at the habits and lifestyle you are living with today. Most of us have developed habits that limit our true health potential. But don't let these bad habits of the past discourage you - it is never too late to make new choices. What you did in the past can be changed, and your body will respond...

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, often the harbinger of bad news about e. coli outbreaks and swine flu, recently had some good news: The life expectancy of Americans is higher than ever, at almost 78. Discussions about life expectancy often involve how it has improved over time. According to the National Center for Health Statistics, life expectancy for men in 1907 was 45.6 years; by 1957 it rose to 66.4; in 2007 it reached 75.5. Unlike the most recent increase in life expectancy (which was attributable largely to a decline in half of the leading causes of death...

U.S. life expectancy has risen to a new high, now standing at nearly 78 years, the government reported Wednesday. The increase is due mainly to falling death rates in almost all the leading causes of death. The average life expectancy for babies born in 2007 is nearly three months greater than for children born in 2006. The new U.S. data is a preliminary report based on about 90 percent of the death certificates collected in 2007. It comes from the National Center for Health Statistics, part of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Life expectancy is the period a...

Could a pill one day slow ageing in humans?Punchstock Rapamycin, a drug commonly used in humans to prevent transplanted organs from being rejected, has been found to extend the lives of mice by up to 14% — even when given to the mice late in life. In flies and worms, drug treatments have been shown to prolong lifespan, but until now, the only robust way to extend life in mammals has been to heavily restrict diet. The researchers caution, however, that using this drug to extend the lifespan of humans might be problematic because it suppresses the immune system —...

A study published Wednesday found that rapamycin, a drug used in organ transplants, increased the life span of mice by 9% to 14%, the first definitive case in which a chemical has been shown to extend the life span of normal mammals. Anti-aging researchers also expect a second study, to be released this week, will show that sharply cutting the calorie intake of monkeys extends their lives substantially. The experiment is said to be the first technique shown to retard aging in primates ... The Wisconsin study, which began in 1989 with 30 monkeys and added 46 more in 1994,...

Being overweight won’t kill you — it may even help you live longer. That’s the latest from a study that analyzed data on 11,326 Canadian adults, ages 25 and older, who were followed over a 12-year period. The report, published online last week in the journal Obesity, found that overall, people who were overweight but not obese — defined as a body mass index of 25 to 29.9 — were actually less likely to die than people of normal weight, defined as a B.M.I. of 18.5 to 24.9. By contrast, people who were underweight, with a B.M.I. under 18.5, were...