WIKIMEDIA, SHARADA PRASAD
Humans live longer now than ever before, thanks in large part to advances in modern medicine, but scientists debate whether our life spans can continue to increase indefinitely. In a new study of global demographic records, researchers from the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York City make the case that human life spans have already started to level off.
The team’s analysis, published this week (October 5) in Nature, shows a steady and continuing increase in worldwide life expectancy over the past century. But while the odds of living to be 70 continue to rise, the odds of living past 100 plateaued in the 1990s. The authors conclude that medical advances have offered diminishing life span gains, and that the biological burdens of ...
