Rapid Bursts of Ageing Are Causing a Total Rethink of How We Grow Old

At around the age of 40, Maja Olecka’s friend suddenly found she could no longer handle her drink. Quantities of alcohol that she would have shrugged off in the past now knocked her for six. Her hangovers got much worse.

Olecka’s friend certainly isn’t alone – when I was around that age, I heard similar stories from friends, many of whom quit drinking. But Olecka, a researcher at the Leibniz Institute on Aging – Fritz Lipmann Institute in Jena, Germany, thinks she knows why it happens.

At this age, she says, many people experience a rapid burst of ageing, altering their ability to metabolise alcohol. And that, unfortunately, isn’t all. This sudden ageing, reflected in dramatic molecular shifts, comes with an acceleration in muscle wastage and skin decline. Immune cells die off swiftly and there are substantial increases in the risk of cardiovascular disease and of dying. Research also suggests that this surge of ageing happens again, at around 60 and 80.