What do you think are the odds that you will die during the next year? Try to put a number to it — 1 in 100? 1 in 10,000? Whatever it is, it will be twice as large 8 years from now.

This startling fact was first noticed by the British actuary Benjamin Gompertz in 1825 and is now called the “Gompertz Law of human mortality.” Your probability of dying during a given year doubles every 8 years. For me, a 25-year-old American, the probability of dying during the next year is a fairly miniscule 0.03% — about 1 in 3,000. When I’m 33 it will be about 1 in 1,500, when I’m 42 it will be about 1 in 750, and so on. By the time I reach age 100 (and I do plan on it) the probability of living to 101 will only be about 50%. This is seriously fast growth — my mortality rate is increasing exponentially with age.

And if my mortality rate (the probability of dying during the next year, or during the next second, however you want to phrase it) is rising exponentially, that means that the probability of me surviving to a particular age is falling super-exponentially. Below are some statistics for mortality rates in the United States in 2005, as reported by the US Census Bureau (and displayed by Wolfram Alpha):

This data fits the Gompertz law almost perfectly, with death rates doubling every 8 years. The graph on the right also agrees with the Gompertz law, and you can see the precipitous fall in survival rates starting at age 80 or so. That decline is no joke; the sharp fall in survival rates can be expressed mathematically as an exponential within an exponential:

Exponential decay is sharp, but an exponential within an exponential is so sharp that I can say with 99.999999% certainty that no human will ever live to the age of 130. (Ignoring, of course, the upward shift in the lifetime distribution that will result from future medical advances)

Surprisingly enough, the Gompertz law holds across a large number of countries, time periods, and even different species. While the actual average lifespan changes quite a bit from country to country and from animal to animal, the same general rule that “your probability of dying doubles every X years” holds true. It’s an amazing fact, and no one understands why it’s true.

There is one important lesson, however, to be learned from Benjamin Gompertz’s mysterious observation. By looking at theories of human mortality that are clearly wrong, we can deduce that our fast-rising mortality is not the result of a dangerous environment, but of a body that has a built-in expiration date.

The lightning bolt theory

If you had never seen any mortality statistics (or known very many old people), you might subscribe to what I call the “lightning bolt theory” of mortality. In this view, death is the result of a sudden and unexpected event over which you have no control. It’s sort of an ancient Greek perspective: there are angry gods carousing carelessly overhead, and every so often they hurl a lightning bolt toward Earth, which kills you if you happen to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. These are the “lightning bolts” of disease and cancer and car accidents, things that you can escape for a long time if you’re lucky but will eventually catch up to you.

The problem with this theory is that it would produce mortality rates that are nothing like what we see. Your probability of dying during a given year would be constant, and wouldn’t increase from one year to the next. Anyone who paid attention during introductory statistics will recognize that your probability of survival to age t would follow a Poisson distribution, which means exponential decay (and not super-exponential decay).

Just to make things concrete, imagine a world where every year a “lightning bolt” gets hurled in your general direction and has a 1 in 80 chance of hitting you. Your average life span will be 80 years, just like it is in the US today, but the distribution will be very different:

Your probability of survival according to the "Lightning Bolt Theory"

What a crazy world! The average lifespan would be the same, but out of every 100 people 31 would die before age 30 and 2 of them would live to be more than 300 years old. Clearly we do not live in a world where mortality is governed by “lightning bolts”.

The accumulated lightning bolt theory

I think most people will see pretty quickly why the “lightning bolt theory” is flawed. Our bodies accumulate damage as they get older. With each misfortune our defenses are weakened — a car accident might leave me paralyzed, or a knee injury could give me arthritis, or a childhood bout with pneumonia could leave me with a compromised immune system. Maybe dying is a matter of accumulating a number of “lightning strikes”; none of them individually will do you in, but the accumulated effect leads to death. I think of it something like Monty Python’s Black Knight: the first four blows are just flesh wounds, but the fifth is the end of the line.

Your probability of survival according to the "accumulated lightning bolt" theory

Fortunately, this theory is also completely testable. And, as it turns out, completely wrong. Shown above are the results from a simulated world where “lightning bolts” of misfortune hit people on average every 16 years, and death occurs at the fifth hit. This world also has an average lifespan of 80 years (16*5 = 80), and its distribution is a little less ridiculous than the previous case. Still, it’s no Gompertz Law: look at all those 160-year-olds! You can try playing around with different “lightning strike rates” and different number of hits required for death, but nothing will reproduce the Gompertz Law. No explanation based on careless gods, no matter how plentiful or how strong their blows are, will reproduce the strong upper limit to human lifespan that we actually observe.

The cops and criminals inside your body

Like I said before, no one knows why our lifespans follow the Gompertz law. But it isn’t impossible to come up with a theoretical world that follows the same law. The following argument comes from this short paper, produced by the Theoretical Physics Institute at the University of Minnesota [update: also published here in the journal Theory in Biosciences].

Imagine that within your body is an ongoing battle between cops and criminals. And, in general, the cops are winning. They patrol randomly through your body, and when they happen to come across a criminal he is promptly removed. The cops can always defeat a criminal they come across, unless the criminal has been allowed to sit in the same spot for a long time. A criminal that remains in one place for long enough (say, one day) can build a “fortress” which is too strong to be assailed by the police. If this happens, you die.

Lucky for you, the cops are plentiful, and on average they pass by every spot 14 times a day. The likelihood of them missing a particular spot for an entire day is given (as you’ve learned by now) by the Poisson distribution: it is a mere .

But what happens if your internal police force starts to dwindle? Suppose that as you age the police force suffers a slight reduction, so that they can only cover every spot 12 times a day. Then the probability of them missing a criminal for an entire day decreases to . The difference between 14 and 12 doesn’t seem like a big deal, but the result was that your chance of dying during a given day jumped by more than 10 times. And if the strength of your police force drops linearly in time, your mortality rate will rise exponentially.

This is the Gompertz law, in cartoon form: your body is deteriorating over time at a particular rate. When its “internal policemen” are good enough to patrol every spot that might contain a criminal 14 times a day, then you have the body of a 25-year-old and a 0.03% chance of dying this year. But by the time your police force can only patrol every spot 7 times per day, you have the body of a 95-year-old with only a 2-in-3 chance of making it through the year.

More questions than answers

The example above is tantalizing. The language of “cops and criminals” lends itself very easily to a discussion of the immune system fighting infection and random mutation. Particularly heartening is the fact that rates of cancer incidence also follow the Gompertz law, doubling every 8 years or so. Maybe something in the immune system is degrading over time, becoming worse at finding and destroying mutated and potentially dangerous cells.

Unfortunately, the full complexity of human biology does not lend itself readily to cartoons about cops and criminals. There are a lot of difficult questions for anyone who tries to put together a serious theory of human aging. Who are the criminals and who are the cops that kill them? What is the “incubation time” for a criminal, and why does it give “him” enough strength to fight off the immune response? Why is the police force dwindling over time? For that matter, what kind of “clock” does your body have that measures time at all?

There have been attempts to describe DNA degradation (through the shortening of your telomeres or through methylation) as an increase in “criminals” that slowly overwhelm the body’s DNA-repair mechanisms, but nothing has come of it so far. I can only hope that someday some brilliant biologist will be charmed by the simplistic physicist’s language of cops and criminals and provide us with real insight into why we age the way we do.

UPDATE: G&L reader Michael has made a cool-looking (if slightly morbid) web calculator to evaluate the Gompertz law prediction for different ages. If you want to know what the law implies for you in particular, and are not terribly handy with a calculator, then you might want to check it out.

Behold: the Cornucopia of Youth?

When lunchtime rolls around, what are you thinking about: your health or your hunger? We all want to eat healthier in theory, but for many of us, attempts at healthier diets tend to be sporadic and short lived. Which is unfortunate on the one hand, since reams of medical research is showing that eating “right” has a probabilistic effect on health — and lifespan! On a demographic level and in controlled individual trials, people who eat better can live decades longer in excellent health.  Meanwhile, the rest of us are getting by on whatever diet we’ve lucked into and relying on doctors to do the rest.  But how long will we have to wait before researchers develop bio-technologies that will halt or even repair the damage caused to your body by aging? Are we doing enough in the mean time?

If it were up to David Murdock, he’d tell you to be doing more. A billionaire several times over, Murdock has lived the American dream, starting out destitute and penniless after World War II and later rising to prominence and fortune through business. But losing both his wife and mother to cancer several years ago radically altered his priorities and made him a man on a mission. Now he’s investing his time and money to improve the state of health, biotechnology, and personal longevity… including his own. (He plans to live to 125!). His message: No matter what you pack for lunch there’s likely lots of room for improvement — and he’s not afraid to tell you so. He’s been featured on the Hub before, along with others of his cohort who believe the key to longevity is eating right and exercising.  Average lifespan (and health-span) are correlated with lifestyle and diet is a big component of that.  Individual supplements are touted as essential for anyone who wants to improve their chances of ultra-longevity – Ray Kurzweil famously takes over a hundred on a daily basis.  And some people take this ethos to heart, devoting a huge portion of their lives to optimizing their meals and exercising so they can spend even longer doing it.

But there are reasons to be skeptical of claims like these too.  Sure, Murdock enjoys enviable health and he’s in his late eighties.  But he didn’t start his extreme healthful habits until his sixties and has always been “naturally slender”: if he’d been predisposed to accumulate damage from eating his choice of less-saintly foods, it would have built up by the time he began his crusade.  His wife Gabriele’s cancer killed her when she was 43: she wasn’t lucky enough to last until he learned the nutritional secrets he believes could have saved her.

Billionaire David Murdock intends to live to 125

Meanwhile, others who have lived long past their 100th birthdays such as Sakhan Dosova (who may have been as old as 130 when she died) rarely list their favorite foods as carrots or cantaloupe. Her favorite food: cottage cheese and ground wheat.  We wouldn’t have heard about her, or her predilection for dairy and carbs, if she hadn’t gotten to such an impressive age – but by the same token, we would never have heard of someone like Murdock who used the same diet and wasn’t doing as well.  Why attribute health to diet, and not good genes, or any of the other predictors of low mortality? Murdock also has the advantage of being a billionaire: that helps.

Let’s optimistically assume that Murdock and other who overhaul their lives to extend them are doing something right, and will get more years for their trouble.  Even so, some people don’t want to settle for lifestyle-based methods and the – at best – a few extra decades of extended life.  SENS has been working on regenerative medicine, which is intended to remove cumulative harm done to the body using bio-technology that we can use to possibly repair damage.  If it works as advertised, it doesn’t have the upper bound of efficacy that lifestyle-based choices seem to have: you could keep patching yourself up until you were several centuries old, not just the one and a quarter Murdock plans for.

However, research in general progresses slowly, and you can’t yet check in to a rejuvenation pod and emerge looking twenty-something every time you have another birthday.  As long as there’s a hint that passing on the bacon and filling up on blueberries will help, take advantage: they might let you live long enough to see the really snazzy tech.

[image credit: Jemal Countess/Getty Images]

Lifebot Turns Ambulances Into Super Ambulances

Ambulances will soon be getting some major technological upgrades effectively turning them into “super ambulances.” These technologically enhanced ambulances will allow paramedics to share patient data, video feeds and other information in real time with the remote hospital – a revolution in emergency care.  This is thanks to Roger Lee Heath, an inventor and entrepreneur with over a dozen patents to his name; his most recent being the LifeBot. It’s a system installed in ambulances to help paramedics and EMTs better communicate with the hospitals on the go – when treatment can be at its most critical stages. Paramedics can get expert instructions from doctors remotely to help keep patients stable and also the hospital is better prepared for the patient’s arrival when using the LifeBot system. Below you can see a video of the system in action. When combined with other Teletriage systems, this system helps create the “Super Ambulances” that EMTs and other first responders have been dreaming of.The platform is the Hewlett-Packard Slate tablet that weighs in at just 1.5 pounds. It features a 3 MP outward facing camera and a VGA inward facing webcam working together to capture both the patient and operator in field use, recording video and capturing still images.

Beyond the immediate capabilities of the device itself though, it is connected to the DREAMS(tm) telemedicine system. DREAMS was developed by the U.S Army Materiel Command for emergency and disaster systems deployments. The system allows for the sending and receiving of live patient physiological data, play-by-play screen color drawing with annotation, isolated video zoom to hi-res imaging, complete patient medical record ePCR charting systems, and multiple camera remote controls.

Aside from the tablet, the ambulance will come equipped with three additional cameras, all remote-controlled from the hospital. This allows the paramedic to focus on the patient while the doctor can take a look at any area they feel is important. The paramedic will also wear a head-mounted camera to transmit not only their work on the patient in the ambulance, but anything going on outside the ambulance before transport, like during a multiple car accident.

LifeBot also includes a barcode scanner to read a patient’s driver’s license. This will more quickly bring up medical information that normally has to be retrieved by radio or wait until the ambulance arrives at the hospital. The ability to be aware of potential hazards that an unconscious patient cannot alert them of is crucial here. If a patient has a pre-existing condition or an allergy to medication that might be used to stabilize them during their trip to the hospital, this will be brought to the attention of the ambulance crew, allowing for the best and most accurate care.

A price cannot be placed on a person’s life, but it certainly can be placed on a LifeBot. It will cost $50,000 to add the entire system to one ambulance. This system is a great investment since it not only saves lives, but also saves money. With the cost of placing a fully-trained doctor in every ambulance being prohibitive, having the watchful eye and advice of the doctor from the hospital will ensure that this system pays for itself relatively quickly. According to Heath, Teletriage can reduce ambulance transport volume by 20 – 60 percent, which saves as much as $2,000 per unnecessary transport.

One of the early target markets for the LifeBot is actually in places with lower technology in general: rural areas. These areas are most in need of this service since ambulance rides there can often be as long as an hour to the closest medical facility. If a paramedic is unfamiliar with a critical procedure that is required to save a patient’s life, a remote doctor can walk them through the entire process. The full coverage inside of the ambulance helps the doctor keep eyes and ears on every aspect of the process almost as if they were there themselves.

LifeBot offers many advantages, but what are the concerns? Medical records will always remain confidential, but should patients need to give consent to have their image and likeness recorded in this manner? Most people won’t have a problem with a system designed to save their lives, but will conscious patients have to give their permission before the system is turned on? If so, what would be the procedure for unconscious patients? As systems like these become standard in every ambulance, there could be a selection that we choose on our driver’s license, similar to the choice of being an organ donor. In the meantime though, how do we handle it all?

All in all, what we are looking at here is a substantial advancement in remote medical treatment. If implemented more widely, it should reduce the amount of patients that don’t survive the ambulance ride to hospital where they can get full medical treatment. The system is already in place in select areas within Arizona, Texas, and Florida. Plus with the relatively low cost compared to all of the benefits that the system can provide I don’t think it will be very long until this system becomes standard for hospitals all around the country.

[image credit: LifeBot]

[video credit: ABC News]

[Source: LifeBot,PRWeb, Mobi Health News]

POM's claims of science proving its benefits has drawn the ire of the FTC.

The US Federal Trade Commission has filed a complaint against POM Wonderful, makers of the popular pomegranate juice and a wide variety of pomegranate foods and supplements. The complaint alleges that the company has made unreasonable claims that scientific research proves the POM juice can help prevent heart disease, erectile dysfunction, and prostate cancer. POM has released a response aggressively defending the scientific basis of their claims and their rights to share scientific results with the public. To date POM has spent more than $34 million dollars funding scientific inquiries into the benefits and effects of pomegranates, with more than 55 studies (including 19 clinical studies) already completed. It’s a battle over who can speak for science and neither side is pulling any punches.

Whether or not they are to be believed, it’s clear that POM makes many claims as to the potency of their goods. Their primary website is loaded with ambiguously positive statements like “POM Wonderful 100% Pure Pomegranate Juice is health in a bottle.” They also have a related site dedicated solely to their scientific research, which makes more verifiable statements like “In a pilot study of 19 subjects with carotid artery stenosis (plaque buildup), patients who consumed 8 ounces of Wonderful variety 100% pomegranate juice daily for a one-year period experienced a 30% reduction in intima-media thickness of the carotid artery vs. a 9% increase for the placebo group.” Of course, their commercials take the health theme to a whole other level of innuendo:

In particular, the FTC seems to have problems with statements on POM packaging and advertisements. Their complaint specifically mentions the following claims by POM:

• Clinical studies prove that POM Juice and POMx prevent, reduce the risk of, and treat heart disease, including by decreasing arterial plaque, lowering blood pressure, and improving blood flow to the heart;
• Clinical studies prove that POM Juice and POMx prevent, reduce the risk of, and treat prostate cancer, including by prolonging prostate-specific antigen doubling time;
• Clinical studies prove that POM Juice prevents, reduces the risk of, and treats, erectile dysfunction.

According to the FTC it is problematic to present any of these claims to the public as widely accepted scientific research. From the FTC site:

The FTC complaint alleges that POM Wonderful’s heart disease claims are false and unsubstantiated because many of the scientific studies conducted by POM Wonderful did not show heart disease benefit from use of its products. It alleges that the prostate cancer claims are false and unsubstantiated because, among other reasons, the study POM Wonderful relied on was neither “blinded” nor controlled. Finally, it alleges that the erectile dysfunction claims are false and unsubstantiated because the study on which the company relied did not show that POM Juice was any more effective than a placebo.

You can review these studies for yourself as POM’s research site has made each fully available in PDF format. Generally I would agree with the FTC’s critiques, and would add that many of the studies are based on fairly small sample sizes and represent preliminary stages of testing. Several of the prostate studies focus on prostate specific antigen (PSA) which, while linked to prostate cancer, is not the same as studying cancer malignancy rates or mortality. And in general, I’m always suspicious of research that supports the claims made by the group financing the research.

Many of the studies, however, do seem to suggest that pomegranate juice is pretty healthy. Given enough time, I wouldn’t be surprised if POM could verify some portion of the claims it has made. Probably not all of them, but enough to encourage customers to drink their products.

So the question becomes not “are POM’s claims completely scientifically accurate?” but rather “how much scientific evidence do you need before you can start making claims in your advertising?” The FTC would clearly like to set the bar very high, perhaps unreasonably so. POM is much more in favor of the open dissemination of information, “POM believes very strongly in its First Amendment rights to communicate the promising results of our extensive scientific research program on Wonderful variety pomegranates.”

The battle may come down to whether or not making health claims puts your product in the same realm of regulation as pharmaceutical drugs. POM is quick to portray their products as healthy foods. Foods, of course, being natural alternatives to the pharm industry. From their site:

Pomegranates are food – highly nutritious produce, designed by nature itself. Because POM products may in fact offer the promise of better health, we believe it is important to share the research results as they become available.

This is especially true since our products do not carry the risks associated with pharmaceutical drugs. It’s a shame that the government is unable to understand this fundamental distinction, and instead is wasting taxpayer resources to persecute the pomegranate.

I’m all for healthy foods, and I feel some sympathy for POM. They have a food product they believe is healthy, and they’ve gone to great lengths to find scientific basis for that belief. I think they have a right to share that faith with their customers. In fact, in comparison to all the outright awful industrial products that are passed off as food, pomegranate juice is probably a miracle substance. POM makes the same distinction on its site:

Unfortunately, there are far too many packaged food and beverage products that are fundamentally unhealthy (e.g., loaded with added sugars and refined carbohydrates, saturated/trans fats, etc.), but that try to pass themselves off as somehow “good for you.” In a country where obesity and its associated diseases are growing at an alarming pace, these practices must stop.

On the other hand, products that are inherently healthy (fruits, vegetables, whole grains, etc.) and that have been studied extensively by modern science, need a common-sense process by which the research can be shared.

Unfortunately, the FDA and FTC have thrown POM into the category of inherently unhealthy foods dressed up as something much better. We know, however, that we belong to the other category, as an inherently healthy product whose scientific research should be made available for the public to evaluate on its own merits

Okay, POM, we get it. You’re one of the ‘good guys’.

Yet the FTC is right to try to set high standards in what we can pass off as ‘scientifically verified’. They suggest in their complaint that the Food and Drug Administration should have to approve any future claims that POM wishes to publish on their products. That may or may not work with this single company, but if applied to the health food industry as a whole it would have serious ramifications.

Regulating the claims for all health foods would probably mean the denial of most, if not all, of them. There are dozens of major companies, and thousands (millions?) of food products that make health claims based on ‘scientific research’. Look hard enough, and I’m sure you’ll find flaws in each of the studies associated with these claims. The same is probably true for all health research. It takes years and years of study to establish the benefits of a supplement. For goodness sakes, we haven’t even figured out if Vitamin D or Fish Oil are really good for you.

POM has probably been overzealous in their claims of scientific support, but that’s a problem with the health food industry as a whole. Whether or not the FTC gets the company to curtail their advertisements, as consumers we need to realize that no single product is going to act as a panacea for our health. We need to focus on changing our diets as a whole, and improving our lifestyles in general, to achieve longer and happier lives. Drink the juice or don’t drink the juice, it’s up to you. Just don’t count on the juice. Health doesn’t come in a bottle.

[image and video credit: POM Wonderful]
[sources: POM Wonderful, Wonderful Pomegranate Research, FTC]

Between 1991 and 2006, cancer death rates dropped 21% in men and 12.3% in women. Fewer people are getting cancer in the first place: the incidence of cancer has decreased 1.3% per year in men from 2000 to 2006, and 0.5% per year in women from 1998 to 2006.

Most cancer deaths in men are caused by lung (29%), prostate (11%), and colon/rectal cancers (9%). The number of deaths caused by these cancers is on the decline; together, they account for 80% of the dropping death rate. In men especially, lower smoking rates have contributed to the decrease in lung cancer. Early detection has also had a big effect, with more men receiving regular prostate exams and colonoscopies to catch and treat cancer early.

Research at the ASC suggests that in 2010 alone, there will be 1,529,560 new cancer cases and 569,490 cancer-related deaths. Women are most likely to die from lung (26%), breast (15%), or colon/rectal cancer (9%). While lung cancer death rates in women have stayed roughly the same, decreases in breast and colorectal cancers account for 60% of the overall decline. Again, early detection through mammography and colonoscopy has been largely credited with the lowered rates.

Both cancer incidence and mortality have been declining since the early 90's

It should be noted that these dropping rates of incidence and death are not equally enjoyed across the population. African American men are still much more likely than white men to get cancer (14% higher incidence) and to die from it (34% higher death rate). African American women are less likely to get cancer, but more likely to die if they do, than white women. These demographic discrepancies are credited by the ACS to unequal access to quality healthcare, including being diagnosed in later stages of disease.

Cancer is the second leading cause of death (after accident) for children under the age of 14. However, survival rates for pediatric cancer have drastically improved in the past few decades. A child diagnosed with cancer between 1975-1977 only had a 58% chance of surviving for five years. Between 1999 and 2005, that likelihood increased to 81%. As research is underway to unlock the genetic causes of pediatric cancer, there is good reason to expect that incidence rates will decline in future years as well.

Many of these trends are the consequences of policy and healthcare shifts that took place decades ago. Some of the most exciting research on cancer is being done today: new treatments are not only treating existent tumors, but preparing the immune system to fight cancer before it starts. We’ve reported on the new BiovaxID vaccine for non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, as well as gene therapy that teaches the immune system to fight melanoma (and can be watched in real time). The new drug Crizotinib is being used to inhibit genetic mutations in lung cancer patients, which has been effective in 90% of patients.

It will be interesting to see how these new treatments alter cancer incidence and mortality in coming years, especially if cancer vaccines can get off the ground.

The average American consumes 22 teaspoons of sugar every day.

The world is hooked on sugar. Ray Kurzweil calls it the “White Satan.” And he might be onto something. The futurist guru has found overwhelming evidence that consuming refined sugar is linked to cardiovascular disease, obesity, type-2 diabetes and even cancer. According to the American Heart Association (AHA), women should consume no more than 6 teaspoons of sugar per day and men no more than 9. At 22 teaspoons of sugar consumed by the average American each day, it’s no wonder that our excessive habit is so costly. Scientific innovation is pushing human longevity past the traditional limits. Yet despite this upward trend, we’re still not much smarter about what we put in our bodies. And, according to recent studies, food manufacturers and the U.S. government aren’t doing much to curb our voracious appetite for sugar. We found a video featuring a talk by University of California professor Robert Lustig that exposes the bitter truth about sugar. Make sure you check it out below.

Here at the Hub we think the world of technology. It’s thought that by the year 2030 there will be about one million people living in the triple digits. If we lose a tooth because we ate too much sugar, we will one day replace it with our stem cells, but one simple truth remains: state-of-the-art medicine and brand-name prescriptions can’t—at least not yet—compare to a good dose of common sense. As the singularity’s fiercest advocate, Kurzweil stands by the power of human reasoning, but he also might say that in the battle against sugar, willpower isn’t to blame. The fight can seem futile at best for the more than 17 million Americans currently diagnosed with diabetes. And it seems as though the U.S. government and product manufacturers aren’t doing their share to balance a system that caters hand and foot to sugar-holics.

For one, many foods that aren’t considered desserts actually contain more sugar than their seemingly sweeter counterparts. Some foods considered more natural, like salads, might be higher in sugar if served with a sweet dressing. There isn’t much to alert consumers to this misnomer. In fact, the FDA has yet to issue regulations to control claims of what is and isn’t “natural.” Sugar is everywhere. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) lists the common aliases of sugar found in most food products, and links to resources that explain how to navigate those misleading product labels we frequently forget to read. But what good is a nutritional label if it lists dubious information? The World Health Organization puts the safe amount of sugar in a healthy diet at no more than 10 percent, whereas the sugar industry in the United States has claimed that 25 percent of our diet can safely consist of sugar—a disagreement with an obvious agenda.

Sugar is subtle. Manufacturers bombard us with half-truths and misleading information on boxes and product labels are skewed to make ingredients seem more benign. It’s been suggested, for instance, that nutritional information be made less confusing by replacing “per serving” quantities with what’s present in the entire container for some products. This popular breakfast cereal is described as “lightly sweetened” on the box, yet sugar is the second ingredient listed (ingredients are generally listed in order of prominence). Websites are no different. Coca-Cola advocates for an “active, healthy lifestyle” on its nutritional information page. Here’s a novel idea: how about skipping soda altogether? Robert H. Lustig, MD, UCSF Professor of Pediatrics in the Division of Endocrinology would agree. In a recent video presented by the UCSF’s Osher Center for Integrative Medicine, Lustig exposes a few dietary myths, going so far as to call high-fructose corn syrup “poison.” It’s a long video, so if you don’t have time to watch it through (which you should), there are a few highlights not to miss: at 15:50 Lustig links Type II diabetes to sugar sweetened soft drinks; find out how juice can cause obesity at 27:21; and at 34:50 who would have thought that doughnuts could unite the world? Check out the video below.

Sugar is addictive. Sugar—along with chocolate, cheese and meat—releases an opiate-like substance that activates the brain’s reward system. So kicking the habit isn’t quite as easy as taking everything in moderation. But we as consumers have more power than we think when it comes to dictating food industry trends, which could advocate for a healthier population in the long run.

Health and longevity is on everyone’s mind. But what good is immortality if we’re riddled with disease and calamity—all because we can’t exercise a little discipline? What good is modern medicine when we demand no less than a miracle? Are we expecting technology to take the place of a healthy lifestyle? If we really want to live longer, we need to take responsibility for our bodies and stop expecting technology and medicine to clean up the mess when we can’t say ‘enough is enough.’

[image credit: Yes-Zim.com]
[video credit: University of California Television]
[source: FDA, CDC, Life Extension Magazine, Coca-Cola, Purdue University, CSPI]

I spent last week in San Diego for TEDMED, the medical version of the TED conference. It was an incredible experience for me, almost overwhelming at times with the quality and number of amazing people there. Singularity Hub wrote a preview of the event a few weeks ago.

I spent last week in San Diego for TEDMED, the medical version of the TED conference. It was an incredible experience for me, almost overwhelming at times with the quality and number of amazing people there.

Here are my top 10 takeaways:

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1. Disability to Super-Ability – Mullins, Kamen, Angle

Three incredible stories, told back to back, left the audience in tears and on the edge of their seats.

Prosthetically augmented athlete Aimee Mullins gave a moving account of how being “disabled” has affected her life in a positive way. She reframed our thinking: “Adversity isn’t an obstacle to get around, it’s part of our life. We adapt.”

Dean Kamen spoke of his passion to build prosthetics for war veterans that are ultimately better than real limbs, imparting super-ability to the wearers.

iRobot co-founder Colin Angle continued the story of augmented reality by demonstrating how robots will become caregivers for elders like his mother. “In 2030, every person under 65 will be responsible for the care of a person over 65,” Colin said. “Can robots help with this?”

Saving lives, restoring functional living: these are inspiring applications of robotics and engineering. I highly recommend watching these three TEDMED talks when they are released.

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2. Best iPhone Apps for Health – David Pogue

On a lighter note, New York Times columnist David Pogue gave his run-down of the top health-related iPhone apps. Included on his list:

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• UHear hearing loss test
• SoundAmp hearing aid through your earbuds
• PeriodTracker menstrual cycle tracker for women (and their partners)
• Lose it! weight loss aid
• Eyeglasses magnifying glass
• Anatomy Lab virtual human dissection
• Epocrates drug reference
• Airstrip OB remote fetal/maternal heart monitor
• Allscripts Remote EHR
• Lifescan glucose monitor

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David’s favorite non-health apps?

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• Twittaround – shows you who is Twittering around you in real time
• Nearesttube – augmented reality shows underground subways in the UK
• Ocarina – your iPhone becomes an instrument

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3. Putting Geo-Medicine in your EMR – Bill Davenhall

Here’s a simple idea that could change the way you manage your health.

Bill Davenhall of ESRI showed annotated maps tracking his place history (everywhere he has lived in his life) and the prevalence of various toxic chemicals. The correlation was striking, and he discovered that the level of toxicity he was exposed to in his life may have been a factor in his recent heart attack. Had he known about this geography-based risk, he might have taken better care of his health.

Bill advocates for a kind of geospatial medicine in which you and your doctor have access to your place history directly in your electronic medical record. I’d like to add this new dimension to my own Quantified Self tracking.

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4. Two Remarkable Women – Kris Carr and Donna Karan

I got to have dinner one night with filmmaker Kris Carr and designer Donna Karan.

Kris is a cancer survivor who runs Crazy Sexy Life, an incredible community and resource to inspire anyone struggling with disease. A self-described “wellness warrior”, she asks the question, “Why, when we are challenged to survive, do we give ourselves permission to truly live?”

Donna Karan took the stage the next day and asked, “How do you find the calm in the chaos and treat the whole patient?” This question is the inspiration for her Urban Zen Foundation, which focuses on wellness, empowering children, and preserving cultures in New York City. There is strong undertone of peace in Urban Zen. I think this model could have a powerful impact if it were replicated across the country and around the world.

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5. Two Remarkable Men – Jesse Dylan and Aaron Rowe

These two guys are among the most helpful, genuine people I’ve ever met.

Jesse Dylan is the creative genius behind such projects as the Obama “Yes We Can” video with Will.I.Am. He is also the founder of Lybba, a non-profit dedicated to bringing patients, doctors, hospitals, and researchers together in a collaborative, comprehensive conversation on the world’s medical knowledge. He started Lybba after his family’s experience with Chron’s disease, and wants to empower patients with the resources they need to make better health decisions. Hooray!

Aaron Rowe is a biochemistry PhD student and writer for Wired Science. He has an insightful stream of tweets @soychemist, and if I could bottle half of his helpfulness, I’d be a happy camper. Watch for great things to come from Aaron. His thoughts on the TEDMED conference can be found here.

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6. Emotional Learning Curriculum for Kids – Goldie Hawn

As a mother of two daughters, I am very grateful for Goldie Hawn’s foundation and the message she delivered from the TEDMED stage.

“We need to rethink our whole approach to classroom education, integrating neuroscience with the latest social and emotional learning techniques. A peaceful, happy child is the first step toward a peaceful world.”

Social/emotional learning is such an important, often neglected area of human development. This approach should be in the hands and minds of every teacher, every parent, and every legislator, to learn ourselves and to share with our children.

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7. What do People Eat? – Peter Menzel and Faith D’Alusio

Documentary photographers Peter Menzel and Faith D’Alusio have published a series of provocative books to make us rethink our perceptions of the world. They tackle food consumption, intelligent robots, eating insects, material consumption, and how women live.

Their newest book, due for release next August, is called What I Eat: Around the World in 80 Diets. They interviewed 80 people from around the world and gathered together all the food each one eats in a single day. After the photo shoot, they meticulously weighed each item and calculated total caloric content for each person’s day. From the 1300 calorie diet of a caloric restriction/life extension enthusiast to the 6600 calorie diet of a recovering meth addict, the spectrum is broad and fascinating.

I love the visual impact of these books, their global message, and the discussions they inspire among people of all ages and backgrounds.

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8. Building Organs with an Ink-Jet Printer – Anthony Atala

Yes, this is actually being done in the lab of Anthony Atala today. He is the Director of the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine in North Carolina. One of the projects they are working on is building functional, beating heart valves, which they exercise in a bioreactor to help precondition them for implantation.

Anthony showed a video of the regular ink-jet printer they hijacked, using cells to print a heart valve that actually started beating! This was one of the coolest TEDMED demos, for sure.

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9. Visualizing Depression – Alexander Tsiaras

Futuristic medical visualizations from XVIVO and Alexander Tsiaras’ thevisualMD were peppered throughout the conference. One of the most amazing was this one, showing how depression actually causes structural changes in the brain.

From thevisualMD website, “Regions of the brain that may be affected by depression include the ventricles, corpus callosum, hippocampus, and all parts of the limbic system- which is involved with emotion formation as well as processing, learning, and memory.”

Alexander said these visualizations are helping people understand the changes and processes that are happening in their bodies, which results in more patient compliance and hopefully better health.

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10. The Art of the Spoken Word – Sekou Andrews

By far my favorite performance at TEDMED was the opening spoken word piece by the incomparable Sekou Andrews. He elegantly threaded themes from each speaker’s topic into a passionate, soul-bursting anthem engaging the audience to “be well and do good.”

It’s hard to capture in words how electrifying Sekou was, especially from my vantage point in the first row, but I certainly hope I get to see him perform again.

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So these are my top 10 takeaways. Honorable mentions go to HopeLab for the games they are developing to help kids understand and improve their health, and to The Fun Theory for their approach to making behavior change fun.

Fat Secret's new API is up and running.

One day we are told that eating fats makes us fat. The next day we learn that carbs are made from pure evil, and that fats are angel tears. It’s hard to keep track of all the nutritional information that is constantly bombarding you from TV, print, and the Internet, but up and coming website Fat Secret is willing to try. It has been compiling information from the USDA, users, and brands to form a comprehensive database for everything food and exercise related. Earlier in August, Fat Secret launched their free API, set to allow almost anyone access to their data for quick and easy reference. It’s Wikipedia meets weight loss and it could change the way we perceive nutrition.

Fat Secret is onto something. We desperately need a resource that reviews, consolidates, and analyzes nutritional information. Not just because such a resource would be trustworthy. The open access, the ability for any website to provide a link and retrieve the correct data, is a valuable tool which will help everyone from doctors to dieters. Right now, who can you ask if you need to know the calories in a cup of almonds? Do you trust that source? If I jog 10 miles one day, how much more food should I eat? Can you find that answer quickly?

Well, Fat Secret is certainly trying to be that all-in-one destination. They’ve even taken it a step further and expanded into social networking. Users can register and share recipes, dieting information, and fitness tips. There are online tools, such as weight tracking calendars, that can be exchanged or posted to a group. Those groups include people on the same diet, or trying the same fitness challenges. All in all, it’s pretty much what you’d expect from a nutrition website, and resembles most of what Body Trace was hoping to accomplish with eScale, though without the hardware. And Fat Secret does it for free.

Creating a reliable nutritional database that is accessible to anyone is a monumental task. Fat Secret’s approach is to separate their API into two flavors: a general API for those developers, users, etc who want to access the data, and a separate entry for those brands looking to enter their information. While having a different door for the likes of Coors and SlimJim seems a little like dietary apartheid it keeps a tight reigns on the doors of the database.

Which is a HUGE difference between Wikipedia and Fat Secret. While both are aiming to be definitive web resources, Fat Secret has a team of experts checking everything in their database. Which is exactly what you want in a database that you hope to trust and rely upon. There is still some user editing and updating, but most of data you see on Fat Secret is gleaned from the USDA or the brands themselves.

As the US shifts from an illness focused to a wellness focused health care system, nutritional information will be at a premium. Naturally, we will want a hub for that data, and Fat Secret might fill that position. I worry, however, what will happen if brands keep their separate access to what would become a universally trusted nutrition source. There’s sweatpants-sized room for abuse there. Hopefully Fat Secret will work tirelessly to keep their data unbiased, free, and comprehensive. Because if they won’t, someone else will. Wolfram Alpha is certainly a strong contender.

Freely accessed and trusted data is the currency of our generation. You, enlightened Singularity Hub reader, could utilize that free data to help you take advantage of the secrets of longevity. Personally, I’m sticking to my simple diet of polyunsaturated angel tears.

Need a better health monitoring system?

Those indicators will be transmitted via wireless connection to be stored and analyzed online. Using software form Life Source, you just log on, and watch how the little graphs change from day to day. There’s even a way for you to share your information with others so that an elderly patient can be observed by their caretakers, or so that weight loss buddies can encourage one another. After all, living forever would be boring if you did it by yourself.

Life Source has a whole host of monitors they sell, and the combo kit has three: a scale, a blood pressure cuff, and a pedometer/motion sensor for determining your daily activity. Other monitors can be cheaper, and some even fit these functions on a single watch. However, Life Source provides a USB wireless connector, allowing your monitors to automatically update online records and keep track of how your doing no matter where you go. That’s pretty cool.

Learn about your vital signs and share them with others with Life Source.

We’ve seen similar approaches to health monitoring before, so none of this is exactly new. There are toilets that analyze blood pressure, and er…fluids. Body Trace also has a scale that will track your weight and send it for online recording/analysis. Toumaz has a high tech networking system that will interface with monitors in homes as well as hospitals. But Life Source is unique in that their system is an all-encompassing package.

Of course, by trying to hit it all, they’ve opened themselves up for some misses. Life Source’s online software (the Wellness Connected application) has the typical problems with allowing multiple instances of the same device on the same profile. Or even handling multiple profiles on the same device. Life Source does allow you to opt into using ActiHealth from Massachusetts based Fit Sense, but you can’t use both Wellness Connected and ActiHealth at the same time.

Whether you use Life Source, or some other monitoring system, knowing more about your health will help you maintain it. As the world continues to age, wellness systems will become more common, and tracking health information more important. I’m interested to see if the US trend of obesity encourages the sell of monitors. Americans might really be encouraged by tracking their fitness. After all, GI Joe said it best: knowing is half the battle.

Lead Photo For National Geographic Feature Story On Blue Zones

Five blue zones have so far been identified and thoroughly researched by journalist Dan Buettner in a partnership with National Geographic during more than five years of on-site investigation.  So what is the secret to longevity and health underlying these fascinating communities?  Do they possess modern technology, do they take massive amounts of supplements, do they run on treadmills, do they have special genes?  As you may have guessed, the answer is none of these.

The five blue zones are as follows:

• The Italian island of Sardinia
• Okinawa, Japan
• Loma Linda, California
• Costa Rica’s isolated Nicoya Peninsula
• Ikaria, an isolated Greek island

Its Lifestyle, Stupid!

So lets cut to the chase instead of building up the suspense any further.  After more than five years of investigation, what has Buettner discovered about why people in these places are living so long?  The secret is lifestyle.  Quite simply, these people live a lifestyle that includes a healthy diet, daily exercise,  and a low stress life that incorporates family, purpose, religion, and meaning.  Sure we can go into more detail, and we will, but at a high level it really is this simple.   Check out this video:

If you have read Kurzweil’s books on health, or pretty much any other major work on health in the last decade, the “secrets” to blue zone longevity and health are no surprise.  In fact, for many years now it has been known that choosing the right lifestyle can have a dramatic impact on longevity and health.  The hard part (for many people at least) is actually doing it!

Although it may seem hard to achieve this lifestyle, the absolute simplicity and power of it should actually be refreshing and uplifting.  People are always thinking that complicated medicine and expensive modern technological therapies are required to live long and healthy.  But it simply isn’t so.  The gift of a long and healthy life is already in the hands of each and every one of us.  It is up to each of us to choose the lifestyle of health, and sadly most of us are choosing not to live that lifestyle.  To each his own.

Pollute Your Body And It Suffers – Imagine That!

For Just $4.99 This Will Destroy Your Body. What a Deal!

So lets get into a bit more detail.  First off, what do we mean by a healthy diet?  A healthy diet, according to mountains of literature, and now supported by blue zone investigation, is one that is loaded with vegetables, fruits, fish, and nuts and low on meat, sugar, fat, and the toxic processed foods of modern civilization.  Buettner actually goes into even more detail, highlighting red wine, goats milk, local teas, and several other aspects of blue zone diets that seem to be beneficial.  Sure you can get all precise about it if you want, but my take is that the exact details, such as red wine, are not so important.  What is most important is the high level theme of generally eating good stuff (fruits, veggies, fish) and cutting out the bad stuff (meat, fat, sugar).

Your body is a living biological machine.  Is it surprising our bodies suffer when we stuff them with inflammatory, chemically destructive diets high in saturated fat and sugar?  The literature shows that heart disease and diabetes can often be almost 100% attributed to a lifetime of obesity and poor diet.  It has been documented in thousands of trials and scientific studies that the incidence and severity of several major diseases, including cancer and Alzheimer’s, can be severely restricted by a healthy diet.

People in blue zones eat healthy diets, and not surprisingly they suffer from these major diseases either less frequently or not at all.  That means they live longer and healthier.  According to Beuttner, in blue zone Ikaria the people suffer from one half the rate of heart disease and 20% less cancer than Americans and there are more healthy people over 90 than anywhere else in the world.

Work That Body…or Watch it Wither

Get off your butt!

A daily routine of regular exercise is another theme that is common across all blue zones.  Wait a minute you say – I don’t see treadmills and fitness centers in the remote Nicoya peninsula of Costa Rica.  But that is just it!  The people in blue zones don’t need to artificially incorporate exercise into their lives with machines.  The exercise comes for free, already built into their daily lives naturally.  Common across all of the blue zones is that the people climb mountains, walk through the hills, work the land, and generally use their bodies in a constant grind as they perform their daily activities.  And it doesn’t have to be high intensity “run as fast as you can” exercise either.  Often the exercise is slow and relaxed, but ongoing throughout the day.  These people are using their muscles, burning calories, and circulating their blood.  Their bodies are tough and healthy, conditioned by the daily routine to be fit and alert.  Ready to fight disease.  Quick to break down toxins and waste.

Especially in America, when we see those rare individuals that actually make it to 90 years old, they are often frail and weak, hunched over in wheelchairs and propped up with countless medications.  Not so with the individuals in blue zones.  Buettner shows us a man in his 90′s who actually bests him in an arm wrestling match, and this is not just a special case.  The individuals who are reaching 90 or even 100 years old in the blue zones are often able to live active, normal, medication free, mostly healthy lives all the way to the very end.  Its an amazing revelation, and it gives hope to all of us that we too can live healthy in addition to living long.

But to live long and healthy you have to earn it!  You have to work your body everyday, or nearly so.  Sit around all day and let your body turn into a low efficiency, low energy, low impact carcass and you can kiss your health goodbye.  Your bones will weaken, your muscles will wither, toxins and waste will accumulate.  Use it or lose it.

A Happy Low Stress Life – Now Who Doesn’t Want That?

Dude, Relax

A life of low stress and filled with happiness.  In theory most of us want this, but in reality few are achieving it.  Buettner has found that those who live long and healthy in the blue zones unanimously live low stress, happy lives enriched with strong family ties, a sense of purpose, and a healthy dose of spirituality, and plenty of sleep.  Unlike the straightforwardness of eating healthy and exercising, this third pillar of a healthy lifestyle is hard to precisely define.  How do we measure stress?  How do we measure happiness?  Can one go to church once a day, once a month, or not at all and still qualify as spiritual?

Although the specifics may be hard to define, I think at a high level we all should be able to grasp the point.  If we are generally happy with our place in life then we behave in ways that promote longevity and health.  We are more likely to take good care of our bodies and our bodies are more often flooded with hormones and chemicals associated with happiness and health.

Stress is especially proven through mountains of data and studies to have serious harmful effects on the body.  Cortisol, the hormone in our bodies produced in response to stress, is especially harmful to the body.  Those that are living a life constantly full of stress, anger, and resentment have high levels of cortisol constantly flowing in their bodies.  The long term effects of this are dramatic, increasing blood pressure, and generally increasing the onset and severity of heart disease and several other major diseases.

So Its Just Lifestyle Then?

Is it really that simple that the secret to longevity and healthy is nothing more than lifestyle?  No magic pill is needed?  No advanced machinery is needed?  The answer is yes!

Living long and healthy is not mysterious.  It is not hard to understand.  It is a choice.  And sadly most people are choosing wrong.  If you are already living the blue zone lifestyle then good for you!  Keep on doing it!  If you aren’t living the lifestyle, then it is never too late to start.  Several studies show that dramatic improvements in longevity and health can return to an individual very soon after correcting a bad lifestyle.

Living long and healthy like people in the blue zones is not achieved through shortcuts or quick fixes.  You can’t workout hard on Sunday and then sit on your butt Monday through Saturday.  You can’t say you are eating healthy just because you stick a bunch of “healthy” vegetables on top of that “unhealthy” greasy pizza.  You can’t repent spiritually one day and expect to erase the damage of decades of stressful decisions and anger.

To live long and healthy requires a constant, daily lifestyle of positive enrichment for the body and mind.  For many this may seem hard, but it doesn’t have to be.  Find ways to make healthy food taste good.  Find ways to make exercise a meaningful part of your daily routine rather than a burdensome chore.  Surround yourself with others that share your interest in living a full life that is low in stress, happy, and meaningful.  Get plenty of sleep.

It is interesting to note that one of the blue zones is in the United States, in Loma Linda, California – proof that even Americans can live long and healthy lives!  Want to learn more?  Check out Buettner’s website, aptly named bluezones.com, which is an entire site dedicated to revealing Buettner’s findings and posting daily developments in the field.