Where to push the boundary of old age?
Scientists have proposed counting old age from 74 years
The average age should be extended by nine years, and the countdown of old age should begin not with 65, but with 74 years, according to a new study. Scientists from the International Institute of Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA) argue that old age should be determined not by absolute age, but by how much (on average in the country) a person has left to live. A new study published in the journal PLoS One (Sanderson et al., Faster Increases in Human Life Expectancy Could Lead to Slower Population Aging – VM), and it is briefly reported by The Telegraph (Middle age now lasts until 74 as baby boomers refuse to grow old).
According to scientists, old age begins when a person has 15 years or less to live. For the baby boomer generation (born in the USA and Europe in the 1945-1960-ies) this means that up to the age of 74 they are considered middle-aged people.
"Ideas about old age change over time. Two hundred years ago, sixty-year-olds were considered very old. Now they are just mature people, it seems to me," said demographer Sergey Shcherbov, the head of the study. In the future, he noted, older people will increasingly resemble the modern young.
According to scientists, their proposed boundary between middle age and old age makes it possible to slow down the growth of the share of old people in the population of Europe.
Researchers emphasize that sixty-year-olds are no longer sick, dependent on relatives and unable to work, and this fact should be borne in mind by government agencies when calculating the retirement age. In the UK, for example, it is 65 years old, but by the 2030s the government plans to raise it to 68 (initially this measure was set for 2046).
According to other gerontologists and sociologists, old age now certainly begins later than a hundred or even fifty years ago. "Today's seventy-year-olds feel fifty. But you should not assign a specific age of the beginning of old age. Between the rich and the poor [in the UK], the gap in life expectancy is nine years, and [the duration of] a healthy life is as much as 19," said Alan Walker from the University of Sheffield.
(If we do not take into account the difference between rich and poor, then in Russia, where, according to Rosstat, the average life expectancy of men is 65 years, and women – 76, old age occurs at 50 years and 61 years, respectively – VM).
Portal "Eternal youth" http://vechnayamolodost.ru17.04.2015