Health
Reach for the 100 Mark
Trying for that 100th birthday may pay off. A recent National Institute on Aging report says there may be more than 4.2 million individuals reaching the century by the middle of the coming century.
The number of Americans reaching 100 appears to double every 10 years. There were only 37,000 at the start of the '90s. The report says more than 70,000 have made the mark by this year.
Institute spokesman Richard Suzman says the more people that live to 100, the better chance others will make it. "The growing numbers of extremely old people give us the opportunity to examine their lives in more detail. By doing so, we'll be able to discover the genetic, medical, social and behavioral factors contributing to longevity and robustness in very old age," Suzman says.
More than 75 percent of people reaching 100 tend to be white and four out of five are women. Experts say those figures should change, especially as medical technology aimed at aging progresses and as other ethnic groups increase in the population.
Read the detailed ThirdAge feature, 99 Steps to 100.
The number of Americans reaching 100 appears to double every 10 years. There were only 37,000 at the start of the '90s. The report says more than 70,000 have made the mark by this year.
Institute spokesman Richard Suzman says the more people that live to 100, the better chance others will make it. "The growing numbers of extremely old people give us the opportunity to examine their lives in more detail. By doing so, we'll be able to discover the genetic, medical, social and behavioral factors contributing to longevity and robustness in very old age," Suzman says.
More than 75 percent of people reaching 100 tend to be white and four out of five are women. Experts say those figures should change, especially as medical technology aimed at aging progresses and as other ethnic groups increase in the population.
Read the detailed ThirdAge feature, 99 Steps to 100.
