A long life has nothing to do with ‘good genes’

When it comes to living a long life, ‘good genes’ have little to do with it.

Don’t look to the longevity of your parents and grandparents to figure out how long you’ll live: your genetic inheritance has a measly 2 percent influence on your own lifespan.

Instead, a healthy lifestyle is the key determinant to longevity, says a research team from Oxford University.

Smoking, sedentary living, obesity and environmental pollutants are the key factors that determine our longevity, and these increase our risk of developing a chronic health problem, such as cancer or heart disease, that can kill us prematurely.

While each on its own has a small influence on longevity, they have a major impact when they’re combined, so someone who smokes and doesn’t exercise is more likely to die prematurely than someone who is an inactive non-smoker.

The researchers studied data on nearly 500,000 people on the UK Biobank and the influence of 164 environmental factors and genetic risk scores for 22 major diseases.

The good news is that most of these factors can be reversed, and we can all adopt healthier lifestyles that increase our chance of a longer life.

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