Title: There is no such thing as aging. Old age is associated with disease, but does not cause it.

POPLINE Document Number: 129061

Author(s):

Peto R
Doll R

Source citation:

BMJ (CLINICAL RESEARCH ED.), 1997 Oct 25;315(7115):1030-2.

Abstract:

Taking all diseases together, except for deaths from accidents and violence, the total death rate in developed countries is 500 times greater at age 80 years than at age 20. For vascular disease, chronic respiratory disease, and cancers of the digestive or respiratory tract, the ratio is more than 1000:1. Natural selection acts much more strongly against death in early adult life than against death in old age. All major adult diseases will therefore tend to be more common in old age than in early adulthood. Once many different age related phenomena are fully understood, some will probably have part or all of their mechanisms of origin in common, but some may not. In order to avoid confusion, one should accept for now that the underlying mechanisms may be different and refrain from referring too often to an undefined physical concept as the aging of a tissue or an individual. Just because a wide range of adult diseases typically develop in the same part of the life span, it does not necessarily follow that they have similar underlying mechanisms, nor that any one underlying change awaits discovery which could properly be called aging. The many diseases of old age largely share a common teleology rather than a common etiology.

Keywords:

Critique
Biological Aging
Older Adults
Older Adults, 80 and Over
Morbidity
Mortality
Physiology
Biology
Adults
Age Factors
Population Characteristics
Demographic Factors
Population
Diseases
Population Dynamics