A 35-year Study Finds That Slower Growth and Shorter Height Promote Better Health and Longevity

Sept. 27, 2010 - PRLog -- September 28, 2010   San Diego, California


Thomas Samaras, founded Reventropy Associates 16 years ago and has worked
with several researchers studying the relation of growth, height and longevity.
His associates have included Dr. Elrick, a longevity expert, and Dr. Storms, a former
professor at the School of Medicine at  the University of California, San Diego and staff member at the Veterans Administration Medical Center in San Diego. Samaras has
been researching human longevity and height for 35 years.

In September, Samaras reviewed his research in a Special Report in the Journal of
Chinese Clinical Medicine. The findings presented are based on data from Europe, Asia, and the US.

The paper provides recommendations to help solve our current health and medical problems starting with childhood. Failure to deal with the rise of chronic diseases
and the obesity epidemic will result in future financial costs that no society can sustain.


The report includes data from 10 studies that found an average loss of life with increasing height equal to 1.3 years per inch. Samaras also found that American men average 9% taller than women and have a 9% shorter life expectancy. Based on their
height and life expectancy differences, the data indicate that men lose 1.3 years per
inch of greater height compared to women.

Based on a worldwide evaluation, over a hundred studies have shown that shorter people have lower cancer, cardiovascular disease, diabetes and all-cause mortality. For example,
a US government report involving over 8 million deaths showed that taller Whites and Blacks had substantially higher mortality compared to shorter Native Americans, Latinos,
and Asians. The Asians were the shortest and had the lowest all-cause mortality.

The report also covers intra-ethnic studies showing shorter baseball players, football players, basketball players, veterans, and Native Americans have longer longevity. Studies of centenarians also show that they are short and lean, even after adjusting for
shrinkage with age. Human studies are supported by robust animal studies’, which show
that smaller animals within a species tend to live longer. Examples include dogs, horses,
cattle, rats, mice, and elephants. Over the last 60 years, caloric restriction (CR) has been shown to be the only effective way to substantially increase a species' longevity, and smaller body size is the result of reduced caloric intake. Preliminary CR studies with humans and non-human primates have found similar results.
   
A variety of studies support the findings that smaller size promotes lower chronic disease and longevity. These include inter-ethnic and intra-ethnic studies and reports covering a
150-year time span. For example, a Spanish study tracked 1.3 million men over a 70-year
period and found a progressive increase in longevity as height declined.

A number of biological factors explain the advantages of slower growth and smaller body size. These include increased cell duplication potential, smaller hearts with greater pumping efficiency and reduced work load, larger organs in proportion to body weight (except for the heart and lungs which are proportional to body weight), lower DNA damage, reduce free radical generation, and reduced exposure to food toxins, bacteria and viruses.

The findings do not mean that tall people will always have reduced life spans compared to short people because height is only one element out of many that determine longevity. Thus, tall people can live a long time based on their genetic makeup, diet, exercise program, socioeconomic status, weight for height, and quality of medical care.
 

About

Reventropy Associates was established in 1994 to study the impact of increasing
height and body weight on physical characteristics, the environment and longevity.
Dozens of papers have been published in various journals and books: The Bulletin of the World Health Organization, Life Sciences, Experimental Gerontology, Journal of the National Medical Association, Acta Pediatrica, South African Journal of Clinical Nutrition, and the Journal of Chinese Clinical Medicine. Books include the International Encyclopedia of Public Health, Epidemiology and Demography in Public Health, and four other books.

Samaras is the editor and a principal contributor to the book: Human Body Size and the Laws of Scaling: Physiological, Performance, Growth, Longevity and Ecological Ramifications, Nova Science Publishers, NY 2007. See website for book reviews: www.humanbodysize.com. For a complete list of our papers and books, see On-line Articles (Publications list) in header of website.

Samaras’ special report in the Journal of Chinese Clinical Medicine is available from:

   http://www.cjmed.net/journal/articleInfo/id/537?PHPSESSID...    

(Note: At lower right below the Abstract, press HTML or PDF to see entire
 paper.)


Media Contact Information

Contact Thomas Samaras at email: Samarastt@aol.com or tele: 858 576-9283.
Address: 11487 Madera Rosa Way, San Diego, Ca. 92124. The website is www.humanbodysize.com

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Reventropy Associates is dedicated to studying the ramifications of increasing height and body weight on health, longevity, obesity, chronic diseases, physical performance, intelligence, resources and the environment