Hitting a century...
a growing body of research shows that it is their will and lifestyle and not genes that ensures individuals' passage into their hundreds. Their longevity depends less on who they are and more on what they eat and how much they exercise and keep their minds employed. "I am a vegetarian and do not smoke or drink. And I keep my bedroom window open 365 days a year,' says Angeline Strandle of Massachusetts, at the age of 104. If life expectancy in the us continues to increase (it has risen since the beginning of the century from 47 to 76 years), people may routinely live to be 100 towards the end of the 21st century.
Ralph Paffenbarger, an epidemiologist from Stanford University, California, began tracking the health of 19,000 Harvard and University of Pennsylvania alumni in the early '60s, when strenuous exercise was considered dangerous for people over 50. The theory lost its significance when his 1986 study held that death rates fell in direct proportion to the number of calories participants burnt each week. Those burning 2,000 calories a week
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