Britons at 90: healthier, wiser, more independent but it helps if ...

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Britons at 90: healthier, wiser, more

independent but it helps if youre
rich
As the Queen celebrates her birthday, she joins a growing number of people
living and thriving in very old age. So what makes a happy nonagenarian?
Yvonne Roberts
Sunday 17 April 2016 00.04BST

n Thursday, the Queen celebrates her 90th birthday after 64 years

of running the royal show. On 10 June, her ocial birthday this
year, her husband Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, turns 95. Neither
appear to be signicantly slowing down. The Queen still embarks on
royal visits, rides a horse, endures state banquets, walks nimbly
backwards (from the Cenotaph), dresses stylishly and generally
confounds the notion that ageing is one long continual slide into
senility, if the Grim Reaper doesnt claim you in your middle years.
The Queen does, of course, have certain advantages when it comes to
ageing. Income and class help. According to the charity Age UK, life
expectancy at 60 for those from a higher income bracket is 23.3 years;
those living on a lower income are likely to live almost six years less.
Nevertheless, once the Queen passed her 85th birthday, she joined the
fastest growing group in the population. In the UK, 2.6 million people
are aged over 80, a number that is predicted to rise to 4.8 million by
2030. But while poverty and neglect are issues for some, many are
happy with their lot.
Its a complete fallacy that the majority of the older old are in their
bath chairs and lonely, says Carol Jagger, 64, professor of the
epidemiology of ageing at Newcastle University, who is involved in a
study of 200 people aged over 85 in the Newcastle area. A minority
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were lonely, but that was to do with widowhood and it got better over
time.
The study began in 2006 and is soon to look again at the group, now
aged 95. Many, irrespective of income, are independent, scoring high
in 17 activities, including cutting their own toenails, dressing and
walking. Half take exercise for enjoyment, 20% are involved in clubs
and hobbies, and 10% help others.
What also matters is that they are rmly connected to family and
friends, says Jagger. In ageing, adding life to years is what counts.
In the 1900s, only 4% of the population was 60 or over. Now, partly the
result of better lifestyles and medical progress, half the children born
at the millennium will become centenarians. But there is a dierence
between surviving to 90 and beyond, dealing with cruel and invasive
chronic diseases, and passing those milestones living well. So what
makes that dierence?
The New England Centenarian Study, established in the US in 1995, is
studying 1,600 centenarians and 107 super centenarians (110-plus). It
has concluded that between 25% and 30% of the factors inuencing
longevity come from good genes.
When Agnes Brinkley, aged 96, was interviewed in 2010 with six of her
eight siblings (the youngest aged 79), she put the secret succinctly:
None of us have [walking] canes. Or, to put it another way, it is not so
much what you do as a nonagenarian, more how you have lived.
Joan Gray, who lives alone in Chelmsford, Essex, shares her birthday
with the Queen and will also turn 90 on Thursday. Im being boastful
now but a lot of people say, You dont look 90. I used to work out on
the land a bit before I got married, and Ive always had an outdoor life.
Gray also thinks the secret to staying young is not to be shut in all the
time. For the last ve years she has been meeting up with other
people of a similar age using the services of Contact the Elderly, a
charity that arranges afternoon teas. I think helping and working with
people does help, you hear their problems and you think, well Im glad
Im not in that state, although you might be ill yourself.

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In the US, since 2002, Dan Buettner, author and National Geographic
fellow, working with a team of international academics, has identied
ve places in the world dubbed blue zones, where people not only live
the longest lives but the happiest and healthiest too the Nuoro
province of Sardinia; the Japanese island of Okinawa; the Nicoya
peninsula, Costa Rica; Loma Linda, California, home of vegetarian,
non-smoking, non-drinking Seventh-day Adventists; and the Greek
island ofIkaria.
Buettner describes the case of Stamatis Moraitis who, in his 60s, was
told in the US that he had terminal cancer. He returned to his
birthplace, Ikaria, to die. Decades later, aged 97, he told Buettner that
he travelled back to the US in his 80s to ask his doctors why his lung
cancer went away. He got no response because, Moraitis says: My
doctors were all dead.
In Ikaria, the people eat simple, mostly plant-based food, sleep late
and nap in the afternoon (a nap three days a week results in a 37%
reduction in the risk of coronary heart disease), walk the many hills,
drink herbal teas rich in antioxidants, enjoy sex and red wine and are
engaged in the community and see a convivial meaning to life.
Buettner has now established 20 blue-zone cities in the US, totalling 5
million people. The rst to be set up, in 2009, was Albert Lea,
Minnesota. The project required that 20% of citizens, 50% of
employers, 25% of restaurants, 25% of schools and 25% of grocery
stores sign up for a year. Parks and public spaces were improved;
smoking and junk food discouraged; schools forbade eating on the
move; giving something back was encouraged.
Buettner says: The programme focuses on making the healthy choice
the easy choice. We address the environment, not just the individual.
In the rst year, the population of Albert Lea shed 12,000 pounds,
healthcare costs dropped by 40% and, it was predicted, citizens added
2.9 good quality years on average to their lives improvements that
continue.
What also gures in the original ve blue zones is the way society is
organised. Esteeming older age is the norm. The older you get, the
more wisdom you are credited with, Buettner says.
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Harry Leslie Smith, 93, is author of a number of books, including the

passionate Harrys Last Stand, a defence of the welfare state. He lives
in Canada and West Yorkshire and did not begin to write until he was
in his 70s.
Did he feel his wisdom was valued?
Many younger people do, perhaps because I remind them of their
father or grandfather, he says. But the knowledge that older people
have is sometimes treated as if it has no value. Sometimes, I cant
believe I was born nearly 100 years ago. My greatest fear is that we are
going backwards. Growing old is a lonely ride. You lose friends and
there is no one left from the past but thats life.
He began life with very little, he says. Climbing the mountain. Its
how I imagined it would be. Wonderful.
The essence of that joy is too often missed because of the negative
connotations associated with what is called the ageing society.
Maturing society might be more apt. The Queen at 90 is a regal
example of living better for longer. On the throne, she couldnt have
more advantages or be more visible as a nonagenarian. But like Patricia
Routledge, still acting at 87, or Diana Athill, still writing at 98, all are
treated as exceptions.
Exceptionalism is itself a form of benevolent ageism, says Thomas
Scharf, professor of social gerontology at Newcastle University. It
makes the very much older person who is active seem a breed apart,
but they are only older versions of us.
Older people are regarded as a burden on society, yet the evidence
shows civic life is sustained by engaged, much older people. Without
them, the rest of us would be even more atomised and work would
dominate life even more strongly than it already does.
Stephen Burke, founder of the charity United For All Ages, points out
the importance of the intergenerational connection. Many of those
under 25, and those over 75, are facing a very tough future. I talk to
young people and to those who are much older and they face similar
issues on transport, housing, mental health. The people in positions of
inuence are aged 30 to 60. They need to see society through the eyes
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of their children and their parents.

Whatever the challenges and growing old in a time of cuts can be
grim there is something compelling about the simplicity of the
message of how to enjoy life at 90: look after yourself and those you
love, and do something for others. As Athill writes in a poem in the
conclusion to her latest memoir, Alive, Alive Oh!: Why want anything
more marvellous/than whatis.
Additional reporting by Rebecca Ratcliffe

HOW TO LIVE TO 100

Money in the bank helps, but if you are overfed, underactive and
stressed, that can negate the impact of auence.
Stay lean, eat clean Avoid processed food, eat little meat and more
olive oil, fruit and vegetables; drink good coee and wine.
Dont smoke
Be extrovert Stay active; give back; remain connected to family and
friends.
Motherhood post-40 A woman who has a child naturally beyond 40
has a four times greater chance of living to 100 compared with one
who does not a possible indication that her reproductive system is
ageing slowly and so the rest of her body is as well.
Male siblings of centenarians are 17 times more likely to reach 100.
Female siblings have an 8.5 times greater chance than their peers of
reaching a century.
Resilience The ability to bounce back from serious disease, such as
cancer, heart disease and diabetes, obviously helps.
Good genes Between 25% and 30% of longevity is attributable to the
quality of your genes.
Source: New England Centenarian Study
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