In today's research materials, scientists attempt to model future increases in maximum human longevity based on past data for supercentenarians, people aged 110 and older. This is an interesting exercise, but I think that all of the results have to be taken with a sizable grain of salt. Firstly, the data for extreme human outliers in longevity isn't great. A lot of it is of poor quality, and the portions that are well maintained do not include a sizable number of people. There are few survivors to such exceptional ages, which makes it hard to call any analysis of that data truly robust. This is a problem that afflicts all similar work on survival and longevity in the oldest individuals.
Secondly, and more importantly, extrapolating past trends in human longevity will tell us next to nothing about what will happen in the years ahead. Past trends in human life expectancy in late life are near entirely incidental, as none of the widely available approaches to treating age-related disease actually target the underlying causes of aging in any meaningful way. That is changing. There is now a longevity industry working on numerous forms of therapy that will slow or reverse the cell and tissue damage that causes aging. The use of senolytics to clear senescent cells will become widespread in the years to come. The old people of the 2030s will have a greatly reduced chronic inflammation and disruption of tissue function in comparison to those of today or past decades. That sort of night and day difference isn't accounted for by extrapolation of trends.
How long can a person live? The 21st century may see a record-breaker
The number of people who live past the age of 100 has been on the rise for decades, up to nearly half a million people worldwide. There are, however, far fewer "supercentenarians," people who live to age 110 or even longer. Such extreme longevity likely will continue to rise slowly by the end of this century, and estimates show that a lifespan of 125 years, or even 130 years, is possible. With ongoing research into aging, the prospects of future medical and scientific discoveries and the relatively small number of people to have verifiably reached age 110 or older, experts have debated the possible limits to what is referred to as the maximum reported age at death. While some scientists argue that disease and basic cell deterioration lead to a natural limit on human lifespan, others maintain there is no cap, as evidenced by record-breaking supercentenarians.
To calculate the probability of living past 110 - and to what age - researchers turned to the most recent iteration of the International Database on Longevity. That database tracks supercentenarians from 10 European countries, plus Canada, Japan and the United States. Using a Bayesian approach to estimate probability, the team created projections for the maximum reported age at death in all 13 countries from 2020 through 2100. Among their findings: there is near 100% probability that the current record of maximum reported age at death of 122 years will be broken; the probability remains strong of a person living longer, to 124 years old (99% probability) and even to 127 years old (68% probability); an even longer lifespan is possible but much less likely, with a 13% probability of someone living to age 130; it is "extremely unlikely" that someone would live to 135 in this century.
Probabilistic forecasting of maximum human lifespan by 2100 using Bayesian population projections
We use the exponential survival model for supercentenarians (people over age 110) but extend the forecasting window, quantify population uncertainty using Bayesian population projections, and incorporate the most recent data from the International Database on Longevity (IDL) to obtain unconditional estimates of the distribution of maximum reported age at death (MRAD) this century in a fully Bayesian analysis. Based on this analysis, there is a greater than 99% probability that the current MRAD of 122 will be broken by 2100. We estimate the probabilities that a person lives to at least age 126, 128, or 130 this century, as 89%, 44%, and 13%, respectively.
View the full article at FightAging