These epigenetic clocks have since become more sophisticated, precise and predictive, Ferrucci says. With a sample of blood or tissue, scientists can now compare a person’s cellular age with their chronological age. If their epigenetic age is older than their number of laps around the Sun would suggest, studies show a small but significant correlation with worse health, more pain and a higher risk of premature death, Ferrucci says.
It was clear early in the pandemic that older people, especially those with underlying medical conditions, are particularly likely to experience uncontrolled inflammatory responses called cytokine storms, as well as severe symptoms and death, as a result of COVID-19. This might be partly because, as people age, they are more likely to have high levels of inflammatory markers in their blood, Ferrucci says.
With schools closed for months at a time, parents have struggled to supervise their kids while doing their own jobs, says psychologist Erika Wolf of Boston University School of Medicine and the National Center for PTSD, part of the US Department of Veterans Affairs.Credit: The Print Collector/Alamy By studying a cohort of US military veterans in their early 30s who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, Wolf has documented an elevated rate of metabolic syndrome. Symptoms include obesity and high blood pressure, which in turn increase the risk of diabetes, heart problems and Alzheimer’s disease. Other studies have found higher rates of metabolic syndrome, early-onset Alzheimer’s and other forms of dementia in veterans with PTSD.
Another negative effect of lockdowns fordnation
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