Pace of Aging analysis of healthspan and lifespan in older adults in the US and UK.

As societies age, policy makers need tools to understand how demographic aging will affect population health and to develop programs to increase healthspan. The current metrics used for policy do not distinguish differences caused by early-life factors, like prenatal care and nutrition, from those caused by ongoing changes in people's bodies that are due to aging and that may be modifiable. Here we introduce an adapted Pace of Aging method designed to quantify differences between individuals and populations in the speed of aging-related health declines. The adapted Pace of Aging method, implemented in parallel in data from the US Health and Retirement Study and in the English Longitudinal Study of Aging (combined n = 19,045), integrates longitudinal data on blood biomarkers, physical measurements and functional tests. It reveals stark differences in rates of aging between population subgroups and demonstrates strong and consistent prospective associations with incident morbidity, disability and mortality. This adapted and generalizable method to measure Pace of Aging can advance the population science of healthy longevity.