Life expectancy at birth could reach 100 over the next two generations, according to new research.
Based on present trends, life expectancy over the next 60 years could soar. Worldwide, life expectancy has more than doubled over the past 200 years, from 25 to 65 for men and to 70 for women in developed countries.
A study of the growth in longevity in Switzerland found that more people there live to be 100, taking into account population size, than anywhere else on the Continent.
In 2000, there were 796 people aged 100 or older in Switzerland, and the number has doubled every decade since 1950.
Professor Fred Paccaud and colleagues from the Faculty of Biology and Medicine of Lausanne found that, apart from a dip in 1918, life expectancy rose by 98 per cent for men and 96 per cent for women, while the emergence of the extremely old population has only happened in the past 50 years.
Writing in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, the scientists suggested: “The pattern of increase suggests that a combination of factors played a part, related to sanitation, income, nutrition and health care.”
However, they also noted that the increases in longevity seen over the past half century are slowing down, caused by the growth in smoking during the 1950s and 1960s, flu outbreaks and interest in euthanasia.
A recent study in Sweden found death rates among people aged 90-94 over the period 1861 to 1999 were directly related to their wealth as measured by manufacturing wages.
