2023-06-26 - Interview Dr. David Sinclair - The Longevity Experts - Why We Don't Have to Age & How to Fight Aging
Transcript
thank you
[Music]
I've heard you say that there's no
biological law that says we have to age
which is which is a pretty radical
statement break that down for us a bit
we tend to think that what we see is
inevitable and it used to be the case
for the speed of humans on the planet we
used to think that
horseback was the fastest humans could
go we used to think that when you got an
infection from a splinter that went
gangrenous that was the end of that limb
or death we used to think that
childbirth was always going to be
potentially lethal uh these things we we
used to think were inevitable now we're
in a world where I'm trying to let the
world know that aging is no longer
inevitable
um and in I'm a biologist I'm a
geneticist at Harvard where I've been
studying this for close to 30 years now
and there's been no evidence from my lab
or any lab around the world that has
found
evidence of any mechanism that tells us
that we must age there are processes
that we've identified that happen over
time but we found that those are highly
malleable we can slow them down and even
in the last few years almost completely
completely reset the system and reverse
aging and so I I challenge anyone to
correct me when I say that aging is not
inevitable
and also that there is a limit to human
lifespan where's the evidence for that
there are plenty of species that live a
lot longer than we do and genetically
they're not that different from us
and with the technology that we have
today like let's say we stop developing
technology today what do you think the
upper limit is of how long people can
live
well with today's technology uh if you
have the means I actually think we're
pretty close to being able to prevent
most cancers and heart disease and
diabetes so those major killers are
already largely preventable and I'm
including things like DNA tests for
cancer and MRI scans so yeah not
everyone can afford those yet but
shortly they hopefully will be able to
so if we stop technology right now I
think that
with a good diet and that knowledge and
lifestyle
the average person could probably make
it to 95. you know there are plenty
people who don't have the the knowledge
or the means to do the right thing and
that's one of the things that I'm doing
is education but I think that we're
about to completely blow past human uh
longevity expectations and history of
longevity so right now people who don't
look after themselves bring the average
down there's covert there's drug
addiction uh that brings the average
down across the planet especially in the
US and so the average is almost 80 years
old here but those people who
um look after their bodies from an early
age and do the right things and live
long enough to to be able to reap the
benefits of today's technology
um not even the future ones
um can expect to live into their 90s my
father looked after himself late in life
and he's now 84 and as healthy as he's
ever been in his whole life so these are
the this is what people can expect now
even with today's knowledge and
technology
and where do you think like where where
you said we're kind of like at the point
we're hitting some of these
breakthroughs what are the big
breakthroughs that have to happen to go
from let's say people living into their
90s to people living into their 150s
well they're happening in real time
actually uh every week there's another
breakthrough in aging research it's it
was a slow field when I started in yeast
cells we were excited to make a yeast
Cell live 30 longer that's 1995
technology
uh things are happening at a rapid Pace
we've got the discovery that there's a
backup copy of Youth in every cell in
the body that can be tapped into where
curing my lab and companies that I've
started and others that are competing
with mine or at least uh friendly
competition uh are showing that that
it's not that difficult to reverse the
age of an animal
um we've done this in mice many times
now it's not that difficult a high
school student could do it with the
knowledge that we have now
um we're at the point where we're
awaiting uh next week we'll announce
results in monkeys for age reversal
we're curing blindness using this
technology out of my lab so we you know
I would say that the Wright brothers are
flying already do we have Commercial Air
flight do we have a Concord yet no but
we know it's possible to fly so it's
really not a question of of uh if
anymore it's just a question of when
these Technologies become widely
available
so what's gonna what has to happen we
need to figure out a safe way to
reprogram tissues in the body and
eventually the whole body uh
we already have done some clinical
trials in my companies we have positive
human data that shows that we can slow
down and reverse some aspects of Aging
biochemistry and the body can be
reversed such as cholesterol levels
blood pressure these are all doable with
today's technology out of my lab there's
a new technology which is even better
than that which is a little a little bit
behind that we haven't gone into humans
but we are in monkeys as I mentioned
that in the next two years will treat
our first patient it'll be uh to cure
blindness
um and so you know the answer really is
that I think we've already made a lot of
the breakthroughs that can extend human
lifespan by decades
um getting to 150 I don't think those
breakthroughs are that far away given
how fast the field is going right now
the investment in the billions of
dollars into not just Labs but in
particular industry that has virgin just
since our paper in 2020 showing that age
reversal is safe age reversal is
possible
so I'm I'm 49 and let's say relatively
healthy like what what what's a
prediction and have have some money I
can spend on some of these things what's
a prediction for the average person like
me like how how long is somebody like me
going to live do you think yeah I think
you need to throw away any uh
preconceived ideas by looking at your
parents and certainly your grandparents
uh we are going to live very different
lives we're actually approaching a big
inflection point for those who are alive
when these Technologies come on board in
the next decade
um so the point is if you know you're
young uh or but some people who are in
their 70s 80s and 90s
you got to stick around do your best to
live as healthy as possible seek the
best medical care
uh get scanned if you if you want to
detect cancer invest in your health is
the point you know you can invest in
coffee every morning from a certain
store down the road or you can invest
that same money and afford an MRI scan
for cancer so stay alive for yourself at
your age uh things are going to happen
rapidly by the time you're my age I'm
now almost 54. uh the technology
hopefully will be here that you can be
prescribed in medicine uh to not just
slow down aging but reverse parts of
your body for for age Eyes Ears uh
probably other parts of the body and uh
and certainly within our lifetimes we're
going to see a dramatic change not just
in what we can do to the body which I
believe is going to be reset multiple
times but the approach of medicine the
approach right now of medicine and
doctors around the world typically is
well come see me when you get old and
sick and and then I'll treat you yeah
well that's waiting till the end stages
of 8 aging cause problems we call them
diseases but they're really the
manifestations of this process called
Aging which we Now understand is a
universal process across the body in the
same same process and different tissues
that we call Alzheimer's and diabetes
and heart disease these are all the end
products of this same process of
information loss in the body which we
call aging and uh those diseases are
currently tackled at the end of life we
need to tackle them uh early and doctors
will have the attitude
and it's happening right now thanks in
part two people have read my book and
and the wave of longevity science
they're looking at patients now some of
the leading doctors and saying we can
treat aging itself we can start early we
could take someone in their 40s and use
today's knowledge technology to prevent
that process or at least prevent it um
for another decade or two and when you
do that then what happens is you stay
healthier for much longer and that's
going to be a big shift as well it's not
just technology it's the approach of
medicine as well and you mentioned these
like things like getting MRI scans and
some of these other kind of like tasks
to do early detection on things and one
of the and I I recently got a MRI scan
which I thought was very very helpful
full body MRI scan but I can imagine for
certain people
um there's going to be a lot of false
positives with these things and there's
going to be other types of things to get
people to worry and the stress of some
of these early detections may not
outweigh like knowing about it like how
do you think about that or is it like
hey okay if you happen to be a more
neurotic person you have to work on that
first or how do you think about when
you're when you're when you're advising
friends to do these things
um yeah I think that that's a big
mistake and I've heard a lot of people
say that and particularly doctors
um
I think that that's that's misguided for
the following reason there are plenty of
tests that we do on pregnant women for
children looking at the risk of say
having
um a child with Down syndrome yep it's
not proof but it's evidence that we
might want to follow up
um same truth is true for these MRI
scans
someone who's young uh like the two of
us I regardless as relatively young we
want to get a baseline reading of what
do we look like now
and then compare that every year and see
what changes it's the changes that are
important you don't go in necessarily
like the Deltas every year every two
years or something like that yeah and
it's no longer just a doctor looking
comparing before and after there's AI
systems already commercially available
that allow a machine to say oh that part
of your body just changed in the last
year let's take a look at that or
monitor it a little more closely maybe
you want to come in for a scan every six
months to keep an eye on that you know
it's not all about a waiting till you
see a tumor it's about knowing how your
body's changing and getting ahead of
that and it's not just cancer that you
see with these scans you're looking at
changes in your prostate size your gut
health your bone health your brain
health your blood vessels all of these
things are important to monitor changes
of and get ahead of it before it
actually becomes a disease
now I'm having Brian Johnson on the
podcast soon he's trying to spend a
couple million dollars a year to reduce
his biological age you're an avid
tracker of your own biomarkers do you
have like an official kind of
figure for your own biological age and
how does one even like determine that
well there are lots of ways um a very
simple one is if you cross your legs and
sit on the floor how easy is it for you
to stand up without touching the floor
if you can do that you're you're doing
well uh someone middle age typically has
to push themselves off with one hand and
if you're in your 80s you might need to
get onto one knee that's easy
um but that's not very accurate the real
data comes from blood tests or cheek
swabs what I've been doing for now a
dozen years is monitoring my blood work
I don't do it that often I'm not like
Brian where I'm doing uh you know lots
of different tests and taking lots of
supplements but I do believe that
without measuring anything you're Flying
Blind like driving a car without a
dashboard nobody would do that uh who's
saying
um and so take some blood tests there
are some ways to do that you can ask
your doctor or go to some of the
commercially available
tracking sites I've been an investor and
an advisor to inside tracker for many
years
um and they've been looking at my blood
work and they and I together developed
an algorithm to estimate one's
biological age using that and according
to that test I'm in the top two percent
of people of my age for youthfulness I'm
about 10 years younger based on that
than my actual age so I'm 43. there are
other tests there's DNA methylation
tests I launched a company recently
called Telehealth which is for testing
epigenetic age which is measuring your
DNA uh chemical changes and so there are
a variety of ways there's no one test to
rule them all I'd like to do those two
kind of tests to give me an idea of how
I'm doing but most importantly it's
about looking at the changes and see how
you're doing and trying to correct those
errors or non-optimal numbers that can
occur over time and you want to adjust
things you want to be scientific about
it to me it comes naturally of course
I'm a scientist
um so you measure a change measure again
that's the the way to go about life I
think and optimize your body and often
I'm asked you know tell me what to do
Professor just tell me what pill should
I take now there are some rough rules
but really everybody's different
everyone has a different genetics
different background different lifestyle
different history different parents
different environment and so you need to
monitor yourself but I agree you know
it's not easy to do what Brian does
there's no way everyone can afford it
let alone spend as much time on it but
for very little money you know
investment like giving up a cup of
coffee or the money that it would take
to have a Year's worth of those coffees
you can spend that on your own health
and you'll reap much greater Awards or
rewards than you'd get from drinking a
cup of coffee and if you can afford it
do both
thank you
yep now I I read your book lifespan I
took extensive notes and actually
changed a lot of my own behavior and
would love to dive into a couple things
one things that you got into in the book
was this kind of idea of hot cold
um and I I had a little trouble just
following the science of that even
though I now do it because it's fun
um why why is this kind of hot cold
combination good
yeah so the big breakthrough
um well one of the big breakthroughs in
the field that I was fortunate to be
part of in the 1990s was the discovery
of longevity genes and they exist in all
life forms except viruses uh and uh and
viruses hijacked them to infect us so
that's you know still important there
but yeah these longevity genes exist in
yeast and plants that's also important
plants that we eat have longevity
activating molecules uh but really the
point is that these longevity genes we
discovered in the early 2000s respond to
biological adversity sometimes we call
it stress but I don't think stress is
the right word because it invokes
psychological stress which is not what
we're talking about we're talking about
cells and tissues and organs
sensing that the food supply or the
environment or having to run away from a
saber-toothed tiger or an invading Army
is dangerous and without danger our
bodies are complacent we don't like to
waste energy so we put our energy into
building fat and uh and at the expense
of getting older
um and and staying young so that the
problem really is that our society is
built to make us feel comfortable and
take away any perceived threats to our
survival we don't have to go hungry most
of us we don't have to run if we don't
want to even our suitcases have wheels
on them we go up elevators and our body
says
perfect great I don't need to put energy
into activating longevity genes and they
don't and what we end up with is early
aging rapid aging diabetes heart disease
as a result of the lifestyle that we
have which is an abundance rather than
an adversity memetic as we call it as I
like to call it and so hot and cold
those are similar as exercise and
fasting are that they invoke this
defense response adversity pneumatics
and so you can do that so it's really
about just it's about the stress yeah
um and it's a it's a very uh and and
doing hot and cold or doing like
interval trainings or or
um you know doing some sort of
um some sort of fasting type of thing
it's a very low risk way of of stressing
your body
right well you can always overdo it if
you stay in a sauna all day you're
probably not going to reap the benefits
or if you freeze your body parts same
with exercise you can overdo it and
fasting of course if you don't eat for a
month it's probably not going to be good
either so you know you can always go too
far but the concept is called hormesis
which is what really doesn't kill you
makes you live longer and and that's
what I recommend people live by is that
don't listen to the marketing uh from
companies that want you to eat as much
as possible and snack between meals
listen to your body listen to me
hopefully and others like me like you
know bars alive my good friend who say
that you want to put your body in a
state where it it feels like it's
working or feels like it needs something
and food and exercise and hot and cold
are the best examples of that
on the interval training side is it uh
obviously the stress is probably a
really good thing what else is why what
is the other big reasons for this kind
of like interval workouts and why
they're better
yeah well it's the shock to the system
um most of what we've learned is that
you can you can eat as much as you want
during one meal but then you you taper
it off during the day uh same with
exercise you can sit around but but then
you want to put your body into a hypoxic
state where you're panting and cannot
carry out a conversation and it's mixing
it up it's it's the contrast between
relaxation and the hormesis the the
adversity it's not so much the constant
adversity which we know constant
adversity is not as good as mixing it up
athletes know this uh people who train
their brain know this
um and it's it's
so that's the good news is you don't
always have to be running on a treadmill
slowly or walking to get the benefits
you can just push yourself hard for 15
minutes three times a week and get
really great benefits same with heat
same with cold do it shock the body get
out and do something else
yeah one minute cold shower or whatever
just something crazy
yeah you know I will freely admit that
I'm pretty lazy I I try to be a role
model as best I can but
um I often snack um because I'm stressed
I often don't exercise in fact I rarely
exercise like I should
um but I do know the science and I do
think that
um doing a little bit goes a long way
now one thing you um on the diet side
you you advised cured meats like cold
cuts and bacon like why is that
oh well there's a lot of science about
uh nitrogenous uh compounds so those
nitrates
um are damaging of to DNA and there are
two problems with damaging your DNA one
is that it'll cause mutations to your
genome which is the digital information
in the body and that's a cancer type of
thing cancer is the main readout of that
we used to think it was also aging but
actually there's more and more research
saying that it's the other type of
information in the body that's more
important for aging which is the
epigenome The Regulators of the the
genes
um and that's what we are manipulating
in my lab to control the aging process
forward and backwards and so when you
take nitrogenous compounds what you're
doing is breaking chromosomes
um and that we've shown leads to aging
because the body has to react to fix
that DNA and in doing so it eventually
loses the ability to regulate the DNA
itself
okay got it now you're you're a big fan
of nmn and before I read your book I had
never even heard of nmn why why is that
good
well now we're talking about research uh
from my lab in the early 2000s we found
that the sirtuin longevity genes that
we've my team and well I should say my
mentors team Lenny guarante uh
discovered certain so let me tell you
about sirtuins these are seven genes in
our body some of us have better versions
than others and in general it's it's
found that they protect the body against
diseases ranging from um Alzheimer's to
diabetes now these genes are get
Switched Off over time
the the main role is to make enzymes
that tell the body how to survive during
adversity so when you're exercising and
dieting and in sauna they come on
protect the body but the problem is as
we get older they become less active and
one of the biggest problems is that for
their activity they require a a little
molecule in the body a very abundant one
called NAD NAD is required for life it's
involved in chemical reactions but it's
also used as a sensor for the body of
adversity when we have
no adversity we're eating a lot and
sitting around
NAD levels go down that's true as we get
older as well so a 50 year old has half
the levels of a 20 year old for NAD
um
and what we like to do is to boost the
levels of NAD back up to youthful levels
and mimic exercise mimic dieting or even
enhance those modalities now we've even
got
um human clinical trial data I was
mentioning one of my companies has done
clinical trials already for the last few
years and by raising NAD levels we can
actually improve human health and we
hope that this will be a drug one day to
treat diseases ranging from kidney
failure to even
covid-19 survival
so what about nmn well nmn is a
precursor that the body uses to make NAD
and by ingesting nmn we've shown in
humans that you can raise your NAD
Levels by about two to three-fold
um and that's beneficial uh in humans
based on clinical studies
um you know when I say I'm a fan you
know I'm not selling the stuff a lot of
companies claim that I'm involved with
uh selling it that's not true I spend
fair amount of legal fees on trying to
stop that
um but yeah any NAD boosters as they're
called seem to be really beneficial I
take nmn um and I've been doing so for
probably about eight to ten years and uh
so far so good I've only seen benefits
some people ask about and so basically
you're saying the goal is to increase
your NAD
um one way to do that is through
exercise you know you can do that by
fasting sauna um but there's this other
way to do it is to take this nmn
um essentially it's a softball elements
and you and and that can also boost your
NAD
uh yes that's what the science is saying
and others have shown to improve six
minute walk so it's being used for
performance uh endurance and overall
health
it's not proving that it extends
lifespan in fact we've only just
recently found it extensor mouse's
lifespan and haven't published that yet
so it's early days we still have a lot
to go on or to do at least but other
side effects for taking it or their
um or does doing one thing make it
harder to do something else or
it doesn't seem to be I mean mice in
mice there's a couple of studies in some
rare cases of genetically inbred mice
that don't have an immune system uh that
they there's hints that cancer might
spread
slightly more frequently in a very small
study but these are mice that are in
bread and have no immune system so
it's still full steam ahead with human
clinical trials there's been no Adverse
Events in any of the patients that have
been tested
um or the subjects I should call them
um and yeah so I'm I'm not yet ready to
say that there's any known uh or at
least uh tangible provable risks that uh
you know I want to be the first person
to know if there's a risk because yeah
football takes it my friends and family
take it I take it
um so I'm not I'm not selling it I just
want to know the science but I do know
that my father is too old to wait till
100 proof that this extends lifespan you
and I are getting to that point where we
can't wait
um and so that's really what I'm doing
is I'm educating the public about the
risks and rewards there are a couple of
male studies that I want to point out
but you know all weight up I think that
the risk right now for me and my family
is it's worth taking that risk until
until further notice now you also take
Metformin
um and um and
um like I don't even know how to
pronounce it but sorry oh it was virtual
where's virtual yeah yeah
um and you know uh and often I'll you
know when I talk to my doctor he's like
well I feel like you know maybe you're a
bit too young to take metformin and I
mean yeah I I often encourage my
patients who are let's say 60 or over
but it has some side effects and that it
makes it a little bit less likely to
build muscle mass and stuff like that
like how do you weigh some of those
things
uh well let's start with when should you
start
um I had a a real
um heart to heart with my doctor when I
was 29. I had super high cholesterol
levels and he said I don't want to put
you on a medicine because you're too
young and I said dude
it I don't want to wait till I get heart
disease to go on a medicine get put on
me put it on put me on it now
so I've I've always been
of the philosophy that
it doesn't matter what age somebody is
you treat everybody the same way you
know within reason of course 20 year
olds are a bit young for this kind of
stuff but if you're in your 30s and you
want to uh prevent heart disease prevent
diabetes I think that it's perfectly
fine uh under Dr supervision taking
medicines that will prevent disease
especially when does these medicines are
extremely safe you do it under doctor
Supervision in case there's a problem
but with metformin for example and
certainly Resveratrol very very very
rare that somebody uh gets so sick that
it's a problem and it's it's always
reversible as well you just stop taking
it if you get sick so these are risks I
think are worth taking I don't prescribe
anything I don't even recommend anything
publicly so I would say talk to your
doctor you know it's if they say you're
too young
I would keep fighting it I would show
you your data and if if you want there's
always alternative doctors
um I just I think that the the argument
that when you're young it's too early I
you know there's a there's a at least I
heard that there's this trade-off of
like okay it's hard to build muscle mass
building muscle mass is very important
as you get older
um and so
um and so you know so you have to figure
the trade
well it's frustrating to me as a
scientist that
when somebody says something in public
or someone a podcast just says it's a
problem it becomes locked into the
Public's Consciousness and unfortunately
nobody ever goes back
and reads the actual paper that this
came from and that that was also true
for the women's health initiative and
breast cancer people still believe that
HRT causes breast cancer and uh that
turns out it doesn't same for metformin
and exercise when you look at the data
uh and it's really easy to see it's not
difficult you can look at it the graph
that says there's a difference uh first
of all is being manipulated in a way
that is deceiving they cut off the
y-axis so that you're just seeing the
very tippy top of the bars and the
actual difference is about five percent
um and it turns out that that five
percent is almost certainly due to
people just not doing the extra couple
of reps in the exercise because they
feel a bit more tired so what's the
solution well if you don't mind having
muscles that are five percent
smaller then no big deal those muscles
are just as strong and healthier
um and have less inflammation
I don't care if my muscles are still 95
there I'm not trying to win any contests
for a bodybuilding but I can also I can
avoid metformin on days I work out no
big deal or force myself to do a couple
more reps when I feel tired that's all
it is I wouldn't say that that's a
reason not to take Metformin there are
other reasons such as gastric uh
gastrointestinal issues that's more of a
an issue but I think it the point here
that I want to make is
make sure that the science is true and
the data that you're getting is true
don't just believe pundits or even uh
you know doctors who are saying this
stuff try to go to the paper read it or
listen to scientists who do read papers
and also just measure yourself do it
under Dr supervision make sure that it's
not harming you make sure you feel fine
and then by all means in my view it's
worth starting in your 40s to maximize
your lifespan because we're aging every
day it doesn't just begin after the age
of 50 or 60.
now initially I was actually kind of
skeptical to the idea that like big
subsets of the population would adopt
any of these anti-aging Lifestyles but
then I saw a couple of studies that say
10 of Americans are already intermittent
fasting every single day over 25 percent
have already tried it maybe intermittent
fasting is is not the best one to
measure because it's kind of easy to do
you just kind of skip breakfast and so
it's kind of a simple relatively simple
thing to do but how optimistic that you
actually will see widespread Behavior
changes
well we are in in the midst of a
revolution in people's wellness and how
active they are in their own health
pandemic was a major wake-up call to
people who stared in the mirror and saw
their own mortality and then there was a
boom in home testing because people
didn't want to go into doctor's offices
for obvious reasons and so it's becoming
also easier for people to take home
tests now we don't want people you know
going rogue and testing themselves and
trying to interpret themselves with chat
gpt4 and Beyond I don't think that's the
only solution I think there's a risk
that we won't have enough doctor
supervision and some people overdo it
there's always that risk so there's a
caution here I do think though that
there's a place for people taking their
own health into their own hands you
can't always be supervised by your
doctor when you're at a restaurant
people do need to realize that most of
what affects their health in the future
is up to them not their doctor and what
you do every day in your life Echoes for
decades and that changing a lifestyle
is as important if not more important
than the medicines you will take and
that's why I think that this revolution
that we're seeing in
the population not just in the US but
around the world is a great thing and
will only become more prevalent and in
20 years it'll be the majority of people
will will be on board with monitoring on
health it's going to get easier and
easier with devices as well cheaper and
cheaper and we'll look back at
two years ago when almost nobody did
this and think that going to your doctor
once a year for an annual checkup and
having the doctor bang in your knees and
cough uh will will send medieval in fact
even to us today it seems medieval
yeah it's in the intermittent fasting
one it's while it's you know maybe uh 10
of the population it seems like it's
it's probably closer to 40 percent of my
friends oh yeah and
um and one I think one of the reasons is
well besides the fact that it's
relatively easy to do
um it's maybe one of the easiest ones to
to to to to do of of all the of all the
things that people prescribe
um it's also also pretty easy to to at
least for people to believe that has low
harm
um and because if you say to somebody
stop eating meat or something like that
first of all I think that's hard for
people to do because they they love they
might love their meat and second they
may they may show you 40 studies of how
that actually could do harm to them
um whereas and so uh so it's it's kind
of like this both things that come in of
why people may change behaviors
yeah absolutely and everybody's
different some people like hot and cold
therapy some people don't um yeah sizes
for some it's not for me although I know
it's important to do