SP, Se 2) ee ee eee

Te Pn, ae Se 4 i

a OC

SO GF tree LEO ree i, | iB) AE al Minty Mt a

hy

grow

old at 90?

People live longer than they used to. Med-

jcal science in all countries has made dis-
‘coveries which add years to people’s lives.

In this provocative article Moscow corres-
pondent Archie Johnstone tells what science
has discovered about longevity in the Soviet

MOSCOW — Aithough on

» the’ scientific side the USSR’s
- war

against man’s age-old
enemy, old age, goes on all
the time on many apparently
unconnected fronts that seldom

' figure in the headlines, a quite

new type of offensive has been
launched on what has been
variously described as _ the

: psy chological front, the home
front or

the Do-it-Yourself

front.

The very word “geriatrics”

(the branch of medicine deal-
ing with old age and degener-
ative diseases) which until a
few months ago was used only
in medical and biological jour-
nals, is now almost a house-
hold word; and even in the
shopping queues you can hear
people hotly discussing the
Jatest “cures”—and often mak-
ing sweeping claims for cer-
tain treatments that the origin-
ators of these treatments would
be the first to deplore!

The chiet, but by no means
the only, reason for this new
wave of geriatric-mindedness
is a Series of broadcast discus-

‘sionS which began on Radio

Woscow in July and has had
so lively.a response that one
wonders why it was not begun
long ago.

The panel is usually made up
of a chairman (a popular
proadcaster); three or four doc-
tors (representing different
branches of medicine and by
no means in agreement on the
comparative values of differ-
ent treatments) and _ several
patients — elderly people who,
if we can accept their very en-
thusiastic testimony, have de-
rived really astonishing bene-
fits from rejuvenation treat-
ments which are, for the most
part, within the reach of every
one. -
Other factors are (1) a wide
network of lectures on the
subject arranged by the very
enterprising Society for the
Popularization of Knowledge;
(2) articles by geriatric special-
ists @nd interviews with cen-
tenarians in Zdorovye (Health),
a non-technical monthly which

Union. Comments from readers will be ap-
- preciated.

\
| could outsell its present cir-

culation many times over if
paper supplies were unrestrict-
ed; (8) one-reel films and TV
“spots”; (4) obligatory “daily-
dozen” intervals in factories
and offices (and a campaign
against those establishments
that do not as yet. organize
these intervals); (5) remedial
courses for “the elderlies” at
many stadiums, clubs
clinics.

Much of these activities are,
nominally at least, the concern
of the Ministry of Health
which, under the Seven Year
Plan, has a definite role to
play — and liberal funds to
allocate — in’ the fight for
longevity. The ministry has
been atacked for, among other
things, its alleged failure to
give these active groups ade-
quate support; but I gather
that because of the many com-
peting claims, the actual choice
of what line to follow is in it-
self a formidable task which
must be tackled first.

At a higher scientific level
the ministry is criticized for
not pressing ahead with statis-
tical research to determine, for
example, what longevity fac-
tors are common to all the cen-
tenarians (including several
over 140 years old) now living
in the country.

Naturally, in a situation like
this you often hear the Rus-
sian equivalent of Pope’s “Who
shall decide when doctors dis-
agree?” but I think the follow-
ing composite statement, taken
from various sources, covers
the ground on which there is
no disagreement:

“Although our medical
science, public health services
and improving standards of
living will continue to add
many more years to man’s life
span, anyone who lazily ‘leaves
it all to the doctors’ or expects
some modern scientific version
of the Elixir of Youth to be
handed him on a plate or in a
bottle is throwing away a valu-
able chance of living to a ripe
old age...

“To live long you must live

and,

wisely, must observe the basic
rules of health about which we
doctors do not differ. And you
can’t start too early: some of
the factors of longevity — con-
trollable, not hereditary fac-
tors—begin to operate on the
child in its mother’s womb...

“We are all agreed that
man’s natural span of life is
much more than. ‘three-score
years and ten’; most of us put’
it at double that figure. Where
there is freedom from other
diseases, and, of course, barr-
ing accidents, the so-called
‘disease of old age’ canriot by
itself turn a man of ninety
into an old man of ninety.”

Here are some points that I
have gathered from the sources
mentioned above, from exper-
iences of friends, who take re-
‘generative or remediai treat-
ment at centres in Moscow and
from talks I have had with
several Soviet centenarians:

DIET: The theories of Nobel-
prizewinner Ilya (‘Sour Milk’’)
Mechnikov,. who half-a-century
ago claimed that the “chief
agent in senile degeneration is
bacterial infection of the in-
testines”, which can be com-
batted by ‘milk preparations
soured by cultures of certain
lactic-acid bacilli’? — in other
words, such things as curds,

diseases and various degener-

DOCTORS are learning secrets of longev ity. Photo shows UBC medical school.

same pattern as the medically-
endorsed diet in the West. No
“crash diets,” but weekly or
forinightly “‘unloading days”
(I translate literally!) with,
say, an all-apple diet, are ob-
served in many sanatoriums—
and in many families. Soda-
bicrabonate baths, which had
almost a craze popularity a few
years ago, are now in disrepute
officially. ~

AIR IONIZER (an apparatus
which gives a stream of posi-)
tively or negatively-charged
“mountain air’): Widely used
in medical institutions here in
cases of respiratory and heart

ative conditions. This treat-
ment has been so widely—and
perhaps wildly—talked about
that a number of people be-
gan using home-made appara-
tus. They were warned that
they were running grave risk.
Now an approved apparatus
has been put into general pro-
duction and it will eventually
be on sale to private indiv-
iduals.

VITAMIN H3 (the famous

Rumanian rejuvenation treat-

fied. novocain),
quite so high repute here as|
in Rumania and other coun-!|
tries, but hospitals use it in
certain diseases of the heart.

sour-milk and yogurt — are
with certain reservations wide-
ly respected here. Sauerkraut
which is fermented, also
gets high marks. Koumis
(mare’s milk fermented) is a
basic remedy for a wide range
of degenerative diseases at
many sanatoriums. Except that
one or other of these items
figures on almost every regen-
erative or remedial. diet, diets
here -are basically the same as
in the West. :
EXERCISE: Prescribed more
often here than abroad, and in
rather stiffer doses, even for
quite elderly people, when
qualified supervision is avail-
able. Sixty and seventy-year-
old sufferers from debility who
have taken remedial exercises
“till it hurts” have testified to
remarkable benefits. Smooth
and graduated exercises, with
deep-breathing, are strongly
recommended for all seden-
tary workers unless there is
strong counter-indication.
REGULARITY of meals,
sleep and _ bowel-elimination
“cannot be over-emphasized.”
OBESITY “should be regard-
ed as a warning signal.” Re-

Soviet geriatricians would wel-
come a report of a “controlled”
test of H3 (a test in which,
say, 100 patients are-given the
injections and 100 ‘‘controls” in
identical circumstances are not
given it, or are given, without
their knowing it, a neutral in-
jection). A treatment by injec-
tion of vitamin C at one Mos-
cow centre is stated to be
“promising but still in experi-
mental stage.”

GINSENG: Before World
War I fantastic claims were
made and fantastic prices paid
($300 an ounce in U.S.) for
this “‘Chinese root of long life.”
Today, thanks to plantations
near Moscow, essence of gin-
seng can be bought quite
cheaply over the counter at
any pharmacy here. While dis-
missing the extravagant claims,
Soviet authorities: accept gin-
seng as having great value in
cases of debility and disease of
the lungs, liver, heart, kidneys
and nervous system.

CLIMATE. etc. It is claimed
that there are more centenar-
ians per head of population in
Daghestan, Georgia, Azerbai-

ducing diets follow roughly the

jan and other small countries

August 14, 1959—PACIFIC TRIBUNE—Page 5

of the Caucasus than anywhere
else in the world. Special (and
possibly significant) features
there are: mountain air (ion-
ized?); plentiful fruit; unusual
variety of green vegetables
eaten raw and in huge, quan-
tities; mineral springs; very
low consumption of potatoes,
tea and coffee; meat (mainly
mutton) grilled or boiled rath-
er than fried; vegetable oils
preferred to animal fats;
plenty of cheeses, goats milk,
onions, garlic; little hard
liquor drunk but plenty of
light wines.

TOBACCO and ALCOHOL:

To an extent almost incredible
in Western eyes, these state
products are being attacked
with increasing fervor in spec-
ialist and non-specialist publi-
cations and on the wireless.
For instance the back cover of
Zdorovye recently carried
what seemed at first sight a
cigarette advertisement, but be-
low the colored reproduction
of a packet of “Kazbek” cigar-
-ettes was a diagram indicating
that the nicotine of one ‘‘Kaz-

ment by injection of a modi-| bek” could kill a rabbit, and
Not held in!100 could kill a horse! That

smoking is a cause of lung
cancer is accepted here as be-
yond dispute. Although pro-
ducers of light wines advertise
their “health-giving qualities,”
even light wines are attacked.
Readers’ letters in various
papers (mainly from wives) are
demanding that alcoholics be
compelled to undergo the now
well-established and very effi-
cacious cure for alcoholism.

\(Since I began writing - this

article the radio announced
that, as a result of the anti-
alcohol campaign 38 plants in
the RSFSR have ceased pro-
duction of vodka!)

WORRY is described as =
“very potent” life - shortener
which should be “combaited

by persuasive and self-persua--

sive methods.” Tranquillizers
are definitely “out”.

On the psychological front
the main attack is against cer
tain popular ideas about the
“inevitability” of old age and

the “incurability’” of various ~

conditions which are ,rightly
or wrongly, accepted as na-
tural consequences of advance.
ing years. (It is emphasized,
for instance, that the process of
hardening of the arteries can
not only be arrested, but
reversed).

eee,

“gent ES

a a gg