Bottom Feeder
Ground Beetle
StudyFinds
Nobody dies of “old age”
Autopsy studies across species reveal that specific diseases (heart disease in humans, cancer in mice, intestinal failure in flies) kill us, not some generalized aging process. Even healthy centenarians die from identifiable organ failures, never from aging alone.
The next time a death certificate lists “natural causes” or a doctor mentions someone died of “old age,” keep in mind that may not be true after all. Autopsy studies reveal that even centenarians who seemed healthy days before death succumbed to specific, identifiable diseases, not some vague process called aging.
When researchers examined 2,410 autopsies, cardiovascular disease emerged as the culprit in the vast majority of deaths, including myocardial infarction (heart attacks, 39%), cardiopulmonary failure (38%), and cerebrovascular lesions (strokes, 17.9%). A study of people over 85 who died unexpectedly outside hospitals found cardiovascular events responsible for 77% of deaths. Even among centenarians perceived as healthy, autopsies revealed that 68% died from cardiovascular causes, 25% from respiratory failure, and smaller percentages from other specific organ failures. Zero died from “old age.”
Nobody dies of “old age”
Autopsy studies across species reveal that specific diseases (heart disease in humans, cancer in mice, intestinal failure in flies) kill us, not some generalized aging process. Even healthy centenarians die from identifiable organ failures, never from aging alone.
The next time a death certificate lists “natural causes” or a doctor mentions someone died of “old age,” keep in mind that may not be true after all. Autopsy studies reveal that even centenarians who seemed healthy days before death succumbed to specific, identifiable diseases, not some vague process called aging.
When researchers examined 2,410 autopsies, cardiovascular disease emerged as the culprit in the vast majority of deaths, including myocardial infarction (heart attacks, 39%), cardiopulmonary failure (38%), and cerebrovascular lesions (strokes, 17.9%). A study of people over 85 who died unexpectedly outside hospitals found cardiovascular events responsible for 77% of deaths. Even among centenarians perceived as healthy, autopsies revealed that 68% died from cardiovascular causes, 25% from respiratory failure, and smaller percentages from other specific organ failures. Zero died from “old age.”
