Making Lifespan = Healthspan

When we think about living a long life, we picture ourselves in good health, mobile, active, spending time with family and friends and doing the things that we enjoy. In other words, we picture ourselves healthy, not simply alive. For most of us though, that is not how it is going to work out. We spend the first half of our lives sacrificing our health for money, and then spend the second half spending our money trying to restore our health. "We need to adjust our thinking and aim for 'healthspan'," says Prof. Michael Thorner, an endocrinologist at the University of Virginia. "Improving how long we have a robust and functional life."

In the United States in 2022, the average lifespan is 79 years (a bit higher for women and a bit lower for men, but not a lot). This is up from 66 years in 1960, quite an impressive improvement. But after age 60, 1 in 4 of us is diabetic and 60% of us have hypertension. At age 65, 41% of us will have cancer - 21% fatally. Our Lifespan is exceeding our Healthspan by 25 - 30 years! This is fantastic news if you are a healthcare provider or a pharmaceutical company. For the rest of us, no so much.

In the United States, we talk a lot about healthcare but what we are really talking about is sickcare. The entire system is focused on treating illness and disease after we have it. For Americans, medical expenses are the number one cause of personal bankruptcy. Yes, insurance is a big part of this problem. But a bigger part of it is that too many of us are just too sick in our senior years. Despite the fact that every one of us is going to get older and older until we die, there is little attention being paid to how we can age in a healthy way. 

There is a lot that you can do to make your lifespan equal your healthspan. Healthy Aging is completely possible. So what is it going to be? A long, infirm life? Or a long, healthy life? Lets explore that together.