AGEING, LONGEVITY AND IMMORTALITY : Part- 4 Public Policy Choices

By His Grace and Blessings, I write.

Ageing, longevity and Immortality- Public policy choices

Dr Blackburn through her research highlighted a host of factors that affect telomere length. Apart from meditation which is highly critical to the ageing and health-spans, evidence suggests that social and economic inequalities, unsafe social environments, abusive relationships, malnourished childhoods, social disharmony and distrust, environmental pollution, racial and caste discrimination, communalism etc. all have an adverse impact on our health-spans and lifespans.

All these factors have an important bearing on public-policy formulation. The governments can ignore them at their own peril and over longer terms any indifference to these issues can be immensely damaging to economies, to societies and to public health. It is not only governments through public-policy formulations, but societies themselves through their social policies, social interactions and social fabrics that also play a very vital role in health-spans and lifespans of the people. Let’s take first example on safety.

Feeling safe is very important for maintenance of telomeres and telomerase. Our cells listen through chemical messengers and our mindset, our environment and our stress are sifting to affect the rate of our telomeres shortening through these bio-chemical signals. So, if in our societies and neighborhoods we feel safe, our telomeres lengthen. The reason is that we have biologically evolved as a social species and our telomeres are as much social like us. We feel safe when we are supported by the people, live in community where people are caring, cooperative and compassionate. Our nervous systems, our health is synchronized to the physical and social environments around us. An unsafe environment and neighborhoods that makes us feel constantly threatened, distrustful, unaesthetic etc. are always adversely affecting our telomeres.

Similarly, socially conducive conditions are beneficial to telomeres. Creating such conditions should form an integral part of public-policy formulations by the governments. The political classes and governments which create social disharmony and discord among various religious, ethnic groups, castes and class, and divide societies through divisive policies of divide and rule cause an irreparable and irreversible damage. In such societies, both children and adults suffer from shortened telomere. Societies in constant states of conflicts have to bear huge losses in terms of productivity of manpower and thus loose on economic development fronts.

Another area that calls for active policy intervention is low folate levels in pregnant women which gets reflected in shorter telomere lengths of their offspring’s. Good pre-natal care and nutrition can be very effective policy tool in these matters. The health of girl child, their obesity profiles, depression, poverty and deprivation, violence and abuse of girl child, nutrition etc. has a very strong impact on their offspring’s health. Similarly, in case of all children, emotional neglect, exposure to violence, bullying and racism all impact telomere lengths and the effects are always long term. Evidence of lifespans and health-spans of children from war zones, extremely poor backgrounds and unequal societies suggest that their telomeres have been adversely affected. Policy interventions in these matters can go a long way in building healthier societies.

Considerable policy intervention from the national governments is required in addressing income inequalities. The evidence from highly unequal societies seems to suggest shorter lifespans and poor health-spans for large segments of population. Far right fundamentalists and corporatocracy have come to rule in many countries. They command national wealth and control systems of governance. Who will challenge such policies which benefit this minuscule minority of individuals is a moot question? India is a classic example of an extremely unequal society where a fundamentalist ruling class plays tune to the interests of a few individuals who control almost everything.

Robert Sapolsky: Biologist, Neuroscientist, Neuroendocrinologist

To understand the mechanisms more deeply, I will take a cue from works of Dr Robert Sapolsky. According to him, early life experiences cause lifelong changes in brains and gene expression. Different types of childhood produce different types of adults, different frontal cortex and different amygdala. Dr Sapolsky is of the view that genes don’t have a role in regulating our health. It is the epigenetic environments that regulate genes and thus our health-spans and lifespans. Different environments regulate same gene in different ways. Epigenetic is where your environmental experiences changes regulation of your genes as and when these genes express. With a loving, caring and safe childhood, an adult secrets lower levels of stress hormone in the bloodstream. When the child becomes a parent, especially mother- the same epigenetic shifts to her child. So, child is likely to have longer telomere and will have better health-spans and lifespans. The evidence from societies which are safe, socially harmonious and conducive, closely knit, more equal and less discriminatory in terms of religion, caste, class or race suggest the same (Scandinavia Countries).

Unfortunately, hate politicians and governing elites and divisive societies don’t wish to learn. India is a case study of how everything can go wrong. The ball is your court…the writing on the wall is very clear. it’s high time for us to learn our lessons correctly, before this Damocles sword of social disharmony, communal politics, corporatocracy, income inequality, poverty and undernourishment, caste and religious discrimination, violence, environmental pollution, epidemics and our own antipathies etc. annihilates us completely.