Thursday, October 12, 2017

Longevity Predictor Test: How Old Are You Really? - Hit & Run : Reason.com

Longevity Predictor Test: How Old Are You Really? - Hit & Run : Reason.com:
"Two as-yet unidentified life insurance companies plan to use Life Epigenetics' M-Panel test to predict how long potential clients will live. 
The test, based on research by the UCLA scientists Steven Horvath and Brian Chen, essentially estimates an individual's biological age (as opposed to his chronological age) using markers associated with turning various genes off or on.
Image result for future scienceHorvath and Chen report that for about 5 percent of the people who take it, the M-Panel test finds that their biological age is around 10 years higher than their chronological age. 
For those unfortunate people, their risk of mortality is 48 percent higher than the average for their age cohort. 
More happily, about 20 percent of the test population learns that their biological age is 5 years younger, and their mortality risk 18 percent lower.
Needless to say, this could have interesting consequences for the life insurance market. 
If my results indicate that my biological age is younger than my chronological age, an insurer would be happy to charge me less for a term policy.
On the other (and sadly more likely) hand, if my test indicated that my biological age is greater than my chronological age, the insurer would want to charge me higher premiums..."
Read on!

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