About This Quiz
How much do you know about aging? Test your knowledge with this IQ quiz.Bette Davis said, "Old age is no place for sissies."
According to an October 2001 report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the average life expectancy in the US is 76.9 years.
Actually, only a tiny minority follows a truly healthy lifestyle. A survey of more than 4,000 adults conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Michigan Department of Community Health revealed that a mere 3 percent eat a healthy diet, exercise regularly, don't smoke and maintain a normal body weight.
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Japan has the highest average life expectancy at birth — 81 years, followed by Singapore (80) and several other developed countries: Australia, Canada, Italy, Iceland, Sweden and Switzerland (79). That data is from the US Census Bureau and National Institute on Aging report, An Aging World: 2001.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, some 40 percent of Americans take nutritional supplements, spending a whopping 1.7 billion dollars annually. Vitamins C, B12, B6, niacin, thiamin, B2, E, A, D, and folic acid top the list.
According to the American Society for Plastic Surgeons, some 229,558 of us went under the knife last year to remove fat; 172,244 improved their eyes; 187,755 augmented breasts; 118,452 smoothed wrinkles with botox injections.
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The centenarian population could number 834,000 by the middle of the next century.
USDA researchers recently analyzed the antioxidant level of 39 fruits and vegetables and found that blueberries took the no. 1 spot.
Yep, chocolate lovers, a 10-year-long study reported in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition found that elderly men who ate the most catechins were 51 percent less likely to die from heart disease, compared to men who consumed the least. Catechins are plant compounds found in chocolate, black and green tea and apples.
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The figure is 44,000, according to a 1999 report from the Institute of Medicine, which is part of the National Academy of Sciences. The total is more than the number of people who die annually from breast cancer, highway accidents, or AIDS. Meanwhile, it has been estimated that up to 100, 000 people die each year in hospitals from adverse reactions to prescription drugs.
But today, 65-year-old retirees can expect to get government checks for many years.
Franklin died four years after helping to frame the Constitution, at the ripe old age of 84.
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One chapter opened with the quip: "Anybody who can still do at 60 what he was doing at 20 wasn't doing much at 20."
The name of this Hebrew patriarch has come to mean "longevity."
What's more, Mayo Clinic doctors recommend a physical once every two years for people aged 50 to 60.
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