Essay: So You Want to Live to Be 100?

(Nov. 24) -- Gertrude Baines, the oldest person in the world, died in Los Angeles in September at the age of 115. She was a very senior poster child for that traditional birthday wish, "May you live to be 100."

Baines lived on her own until she was 105. By all accounts she was mentally alert, pleased to be alive, and coping nicely with her physical limitations. She said she owed her longevity to God, helped by the fact that she never drank, smoked or "fooled around."

Centenarians have a very positive public image, but the truth is more complicated. Half of America's 80,000 or so centenarians have serious dementia. Half of them live in nursing homes because of some combination of dementia, physical frailty or disease, and lack of any personal support system, financial or emotional.

So despite all the media happy talk, the life of a centenarian often leaves a great deal to be desired. Of course, that doesn't stop me from wanting to reach that magic number.

In fact, I just checked out my chances on the Life Expectancy Calculator, a Web site put together by a pioneer in the study of centenarians, Dr. Thomas T. Perls. After answering 40 multiple-choice questions about my health, lifestyle, eating habits and medical history, I flunked. The calculator said I'd get to 91 but no further. Mind you, I'm not complaining, but still ...

It used to be thought that you became a centenarian by avoiding major age-related problems like heart disease, cancer and diabetes. That was largely a function of your genes. But Perls found that 40 percent of the centenarians he studied have actually experienced one or more of these diseases – and been able to cope with them and carry on.

For many, their coping mechanism includes a deliberate effort to combat the genetic crap shoot. If you're born with a predisposition for obesity, which sets you up for heart disease and diabetes, you can beat it by exercising regularly and controlling your diet. If you're a Type A person, you can make sure you find ways to reduce stress, which can play havoc with your immune system.

In other words, to a significant degree, your longevity is up to you. The life expectancy calculator makes it all too clear: By modifying my diet and lifestyle, I could live an extra 4.5 years. Of course, it would still not take me to 100. For that I'd need a little more help from my genes.

On the other hand, science may come to the rescue. Many biologists today believe that our bodies already possess the wherewithal to fight off age-related diseases. In recent experiments, the changing of individual genes in laboratory animals has led to a substantial increase in their longevity.

Researchers have discovered that mice restricted to a diet that is a third lower in calories than normal will live up to 40 percent longer than normal. Some drug compounds, including resveratrol, an ingredient in red wine, have kicked off gene changes that seem to copy the effects of calorie restriction. Among the mice, the drugs have held off lung and colon cancer, Type 2 diabetes, and cardiovascular disease, among others. They have not been shown to have similar results in humans, even though such false claims have been made for resveratrol, which has been widely marketed.

Recently, another drug entered the anti-aging lists. It was discovered, quite by accident, that the antibiotic rapamycin increased the life span of female mice by 14 percent, male mice by 9 percent. The researchers involved don't know why a drug used to suppress transplant patients' immune systems would extend a rodent's life, but they hope to find out.

Centenarians, human and their mouse equivalents, are busting out all over. They are the country's fastest growing age group, having more than doubled since 1990. By 2050, when baby boomers start to weigh in, the Census Bureau expects there will be more than 600,000 centenarians, eight times today's number.

The impact of this ultimate age wave will be substantial. Centenarians generally die quickly, without requiring lengthy, costly treatments that could squeeze Medicare, but they do collect lots of extra years of Social Security payments. If you're going to live that long, you have to rethink your retirement plans: Will there be enough money to support you for an additional 10 or 20 years? Will you have to keep working into your 70s? And how will your children, with their own aches and pains at age 75, feel about continuing to care for and worry about their centenarian parents?

Last month, Robert and Gladys Lloyd, 103 and 104, of North Tonawanda, N.Y., died within a day of each other, and their ashes were buried in the same plot. "They just always did things together," their daughter said. Until their final months, they were still at home, Gladys sewing and cooking and Robert maintaining his model train layout.

If you're going to be a centenarian, that's the way to do it.