Radical human life extension is deemed unlikely this century. Since 1990, improvements in life expectancy have slowed, and reaching age 100 remains rare without breakthroughs in slowing biological ageing. Maximum lifespan is constrained by biological limits and diminishing returns on public health advancements
October 2024 – Nature Aging
Key takeaways
- Radical life extension is unlikely this century: Advances in life expectancy have slowed significantly since 1990, with only marginal gains in long-lived populations. Without groundbreaking interventions to slow biological ageing, the likelihood of individuals routinely surpassing 100 years remains limited
- Survival to 100 years is rare: Current data shows that fewer than 15% of women and 5% of men are expected to live to 100 in the most long-lived populations. Even in optimal conditions, the demographic changes required for widespread centenarian survival are unlikely to occur in this century
- Biological ageing is a critical barrier: Public health and medical advancements have addressed many causes of early mortality, but biological ageing remains the dominant factor limiting further increases in lifespan. Achieving significant life extension would require interventions that fundamentally alter ageing processes at a cellular and systemic level
The reductions in death rates needed to raise life expectancy further are becoming harder to achieve. For example, increasing life expectancy by just one year now requires much larger declines in mortality rates than in previous decades, highlighting the challenges in pushing the boundaries of human longevity.
Read the article at: Olshansky, S. Jay, et al. “Implausibility of Radical Life Extension in Humans in the Twenty-First Century.” Nature Aging, vol. 4, 2024, pp. 1635–1642, doi:10.1038/s43587-024-00702-3.