Island where people live longer than anyone on earth- maybe its drinking the wine?

The optimal balance of mTor and AMPK, the two opposite biological mechanisms that drive cell proliferation and growth versus those that drive autophagy, protect mitochondrial homeostasis and optimize metabolism, and increase long-term health and longevity. Some of the factors that affect our health, aging, and lifespan are fortuitous and others are predictable. Then there's of course luck. Avoiding the plague and not getting hit by a garbage truck going 80. Stress is really bad. Island vacations tend to be low-stress. 🏝️
 
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The optimal balance of mTor and AMPK, the two opposite biological mechanisms that drive cell proliferation and growth versus those that drive autophagy, protect mitochondrial homeostasis and optimize metabolism, and increase long-term health and longevity. Some of the factors that affect our health, aging, and lifespan are fortuitous and others are predictable. Then there's of course luck. Avoiding the plague and not getting hit by a garbage truck going 80. Stress is really bad. Island vacations tend to be low-stress. 🏝️
Yes, stress kill us and make us ill
 
That's pretty close to the absolute truth.

People die of infectious diseases. People have habits that shorten their lives (smoking, drugs, drinking to excess, overeating). And a few people (and I mean very few) have workplace exposures that lead to major health problems (asbestos and silica being a couple of top tier bad exposures). There are a very small number of environmental exposures of note - radon gas being one of them. And people die of accidents of various kinds, warfare, and in some places violence.

And that's about it. The rest is genetics.
For instance, my dad died of a blood cancer. It runs in his side of the family. He led the epitome of the healthiest lifestyle imaginable. Had the perfect healthiest diet, lifted weights, ran almost every night, etc. But you can't beat genetics unfortunately.
 
I sure hope it's the red wine!


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Every single time I see some type of profile of some area in the world where people routinely live to be this age, I notice a few inevitable common factors: The elderly are active and they are vital within, and deeply connected to, their communities. They still serve a purpose.

And they don't eat garbage. Areas of the world where people often live to be this old are often also places that are without an excess of industrial pollutants that we might find in more urban areas. And they are places where the food is more local and less processed.
 
My Wife watched the video, and her phone was on autoplay so she watched about three more videos of people have well above average life expectancy.

Her take is the extended life expectancy is not centered in genetics. She believes other factors are the primary reasons for the extended life expectancy on this island, and like location in Japan, etc. She believes the physical/ active lifestyle is a major component of the extended life expectancy. Although not directly relevant to subject matter expertise- my wife is a behavioral health professional.

What blew my away on the video was not the extended life expectancy- but the near zero occurrences of dementia on the island. I would love to know how that is possible.
 
Two things about Iceland that stood out to me:

its whole population is less than 400K on Iceland, and

when comes down to annual measure of the quality of life around the world, Iceland is pretty much among top 10 countries around the world, year by year
 
I would guess a lot of it is genetics.
I think that is largely correct. Diet and exercise are not "cure-alls" and while careful management can extend life a bit over an otherwise healthy normal weight person, there may not be a direct correlation between any specific food and lifespan. Red wine being the exception, as the ethanol is strongly cardio protective.

Take Asian people away from "long life" locations and as long as they remain thin, they maintain a long life. While I won't post the actuary tables here, it's worth a careful study. In particular, when groups are distinct....
 
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