Lifespan

[trillian]

From the email after reviewing DRAFT position paper on Natural Vitamin C

What is the difference between scurvy and health? If you are on the ship in days of old and eat an orange or lemon, scurvy was eliminated. am I right? what has changed in the last 75 years to spur on CVD? haven't people been eating more fruits than ever or am I missing something? why would we need such massive amounts of C now to prevent CVD and not before? T

One important point about what has changed in the last 75 years is lifespan. If you only live to the age of 50 there are diseases
that may not get you but would have had you lived longer. In 1900 the average life expectancy in the US was 47! Further back
in history and the lifespans were shorter still. (remember that life expectancy in 1900 was based on the history prior and massive
changes in medicine and sanitation took place by the turn of the century)

The website below has a chart and if the figures are accurate you can easily see
how early man could have lived with fairly drastic deficiencies and still survived. A species only has to live long enough to
reproduce to survive and keep in mind that early humans would have been giving birth from the very earliest age they were
physically capable of doing so.


http://www.drmcdougall.com/misc/2006nl/ ... /aging.htm

[Dottore]

Trillian, it is sloppy reporting to say that the US lifespan was 47 in 1900.
Are you talking about years left to live at age 0, at 40, at 50 or at 60 etc?
I would love to see a cite that supports the figure 47 though.
Life expectancy at birth was significantly lower in 1900 due to illnesses like pneumonia and other infectious diseases. Once people reached a certain age, like 40, their lifespans are comparable to today. In case you missed it, total life expectancy of males in North America has, for the first time in decades, fallen below 70 again and the trend is down.

Dottore

[Cis4me]

As far as I know life expectancy or current and past populations has always been expressed as the length of time between birth and death (right or wrong). It would be very interesting to see any studies accounting for things like various birth/childhood deaths.

Just remember that lots and lots of people have to live to be 100 to counteract the effect of say a baby that dies after 2 days because it was born 1 month premature in 1900.

Many people mention disease as causes of death in populations who lived >100 years ago, but you also have to remember that life back then was much more physically demanding, medical treatment for injuries from accidents was not nearly as good as it is today, and people tended to start working at a much younger age. Again a 7 year old killed working on a farm is going to do a lot of damage to a population's "life expectancy".

[Kathy]

Trillian, it is sloppy reporting to say that the US lifespan was 47 in 1900.
Are you talking about years left to live at age 0, at 40, at 50 or at 60 etc?
I would love to see a cite that supports the figure 47 though. . . .

What makes it sloppy? The cite given in the McDougall article that Trillian listed cites a 2004 CDC report based on statistical analysis of death certificates issued in the US. (http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/hus/hus04trend.pdf#027, p.77 table 27). The footnotes of the CDC report lead me to Vital Statistics Rates in the United States 1900 - 1941. The Vital Statistics Reports are quite hefty and really much more than I can digest. But, if anyone is interested in the early 20th century stats: http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/vsus/vsrates1940_60.pdf

[Dottore]

I have not been able to find the site of the Canadian Government on this question. The difference between actual lifespan as in expectation of years a person is likely to live between 1900 and 1990 is very small.
There is also the difference in quality of life then and now.
Who today dies from old age? How many active 80 year olds do you know?

It is a complex subject deserving of more than simple answers. The statistic as presented mislead.

Dottore

[trillian]

Trillian, it is sloppy reporting to say that the US lifespan was 47 in 1900.
Are you talking about years left to live at age 0, at 40, at 50 or at 60 etc?
I would love to see a cite that supports the figure 47 though.
Life expectancy at birth was significantly lower in 1900 due to illnesses like pneumonia and other infectious diseases. Once people reached a certain age, like 40, their lifespans are comparable to today. In case you missed it, total life expectancy of males in North America has, for the first time in decades, fallen below 70 again and the trend is down.

Dottore

I did mention that life expectancy in 1900 was based on the period prior and that improvements in several areas led to an increase during the 20th century. I know there is a difference between life 'expectancy' and actual lifespan. Usually the predicted lifespan is based on reaching a certain age. My point was mainly that it is ridiculous to talk about the incidence of heart disease, cancer etc. (in the context of a requirement for vit C) by using the health of people 100 years ago to compare because the harsh reality is that their health was very poor on average and it was not uncommon to die very young. Certain lifestyle and environmental factors may be the cause of decreasing life expectancy now but that is after a long trend of an ever growing percentage living into old age.