Living Well Are you prepared to live to 150 years old?
According to a study published in 2021, the maximum human life expectancy is somewhere between 120 and 150 years.
The oldest living person, as far as we know, was Jeanne Calment who died at age 122 in 1997.
Most of us won't make it to 100 years. Currently, the average life expectancy in the U.S. is 74.8 years for men and 80.2 years for women. But we're living longer than ever, thanks to advances in medical technology.
But rather than worrying about our lifespan (the number of years we'll live), what we should worry about more is our healthspan...
Our healthspan is the time folks have at nearly full health, not battling disease or decline. For our bodies, that means having excellent mobility and freedom from pain. For the mind, it's having excellent cognitive function.
The goal isn't just a longer life, but a healthier life, too. And according to a recent study, if you're middle-aged, there's a way to reach your 70s with a high quality of life and without any hitches in your health...
The study was a joint effort between researchers from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and universities in Copenhagen and Montreal. The team used data from the Nurses' Health Study and the Health Professionals Follow-Up Study. Specifically, the team reviewed 30 years of data from more than 105,000 folks aged between 39 and 69.
The data consisted of food surveys to see how well each participant stuck to healthy diets that emphasized consuming plenty of vegetables, fruits, whole grains, healthy fats, nuts, and legumes.
Researchers found that 9.3% of participants aged the way we all want to age: without developing any major chronic diseases and maintaining their physical, mental, and cognitive health.
Just as you'd expect, the team found that this healthy aging was linked to adhering to a healthy diet with a high intake of those foods.
But the study showed that this healthy aging was also linked to eating less of something else: ultra-processed foods like processed meat and sugary drinks.
Currently, around 60% of the average American adult's diet consists of ultra-processed foods. Ultra-processed foods have these qualities in common:
- They're the result of many industrial processing steps.
- They're also full of preservatives and additives like emulsifiers (thickeners) and artificial colors and flavors.
- They're usually lacking in fiber, vitamins, and minerals.
- They're laden with added sugar, salt, and unhealthy fats.
And the evidence is mounting that overdoing the ultra-processed foods can send you to an early grave in several ways...
A May 2024 BMJ study also involving the Nurses' Health Study data found that eating lots of those unhealthy ultra-processed foods and beverages could bump up your risk of early death... specifically, a 4% higher risk of all-cause mortality and an 8% higher risk of dying due to a neurodegenerative disease (like Alzheimer's disease).
Another 2024 BMJ study found that eating too many ultra-processed foods has direct ties to 32 negative health outcomes like anxiety, depression, Type 2 diabetes, poor sleep, and all-cause mortality.
Now, I'll still indulge in bacon... just in moderation. I also use some food swaps and substitutions to limit my intake of other ultra-processed foods. For example...
- Using flavorful herbs and spices on lean chicken and turkey breasts instead of those slimy slivers of lunchmeats,
- And cutting up fruits and adding them to my sparkling water if I get a craving for soda. Dicing up some frozen fruit works great in place of ice cubes.
So to sum it up, eat more whole foods and less of the kind that have a block of text on the ingredients label. That way, you'll be more likely to find yourself happy and healthy, blowing out the candles on your 70th birthday. (And yes, I'll still indulge in the occasional slice of birthday cake.)
P.S. For more on healthy aging, check out my latest Retirement Millionaire issue, where I talk about another way to protect your brain (your most precious asset as you age) from a common injury that happens to an older American every second, on average. If you don't have a Retirement Millionaire subscription, try one out right here.
What We're Reading...
- Could adding extra protein to ultra-processed foods reduce overeating?
- Something different: The "world's ugliest animal" is "fish of the year" in New Zealand.
Here's to our health, wealth, and a great retirement,
Dr. David Eifrig and the Health & Wealth Bulletin Research Team
March 25, 2025