For decades, it has been known that social advantage is linked to better health. Studies have suggested that this may be due to multiple factors. These include the environment, such as toxins and pollution. Others suggest personal negative behaviours such as smoking or alcohol and drugs. Diet and exercise have an impact. So, too does medicines in the form of screenings, vaccinations and medication.

How the link happens has been less debated. Recently scientists found that people with more social advantages had fewer key proteins in their blood. These are the ones linked to the ageing process. These findings suggest social advantage may also slow down the ageing process itself.

Deprivation and Longevity

Life expectancy in the UK has improved. Of people born in 1905, only 62% lived to 60 compared with 89% of those born in 1955. For people born today, 96% can be expected to live to 60.(The Health Foundation) These however are averages. There are variations depending on the environment in which people live.

Governments have all studied deprivation. Deprivation is defined in the UK based on seven different domains. Some are economic domains that relate to income, employment and training. Others relate directly to health and to the living environment. Lifestyle is included with “Crime” and “Barriers to Housing and Services”. (See Newsletter #052).The impact of deprivation is clear from the UK numbers. There is a ten -year difference for men in life expectancy between the first and the tenth levels. The number is 8 years for women. Chronic diseases appear sooner and more often with deprivation.

Deprivation and Ageing.

The recent article in Nature pointed out that the symptoms of deprivation and ageing are the same. They suggested that deprivation works on health through the ageing process. To unpick the relationship, they used huge longitudinal studies. Those studies came from the UK and Finland. These capture the life journey of the participants from which to assess deprivation. They included full medical records. They also included blood tests.

Those blood tests measured circulating proteins. Many proteins are known to impact the ageing process. Others are produced by the ageing process. The protein count reflects age related processes. They are visible often before the disease. The longitudinal studies allowed them to measure one large group over 10 years and another over 20 years. The could look at the individual level at the emergence of proteins and diseases.

They started by looking at 66 diseases typically associated with ageing. They confirmed earlier studies. Averaged across the list of diseases, there was a 20% higher risk of disease. This was in the most disadvantaged group relative to the most advantaged. For some diseases the risk was more than twice as high. Those diseases included type 2 diabetes, liver disease, heart disease, lung cancer and stroke.

When these diseases appeared depended on the levels of deprivation. There was a five-year gap in the onset. After 15 years those with low socioeconomic status had a given number of diseases. Those in the high socioeconomic status group did reach that number for a further 5 years.

They were able to use the blood proteins as independent “biomarkers” of ageing. Ageing metrics that are independent of chronological age. These biomarkers enabled them to assess how social differences dictate the pace of ageing. To do this they compared people, with the same chronological age, living in different levels of deprivation. It appeared that the further from deprivation you are the slower your ageing process.

The scientists found that the levels of 14 plasma proteins were affected by socioeconomic advantage. Specifically, these proteins are known to regulate inflammatory and cellular stress responses. The researchers estimated that up to 39% of the reduced disease risk was influenced by these “ageing” proteins.

Other studies using a Frailty Index show the same results. A Frailty Index is a composite of multiple physiological and psychological measures of ageing. They can include everything from muscle mass and grip strength to performance on memory tests. Frailty increases with age and grows exponentially in the final years of life. Studies across the world have shown a “cohort effect”. The curve relating the chronological age to frailty is moving. It moves to the right with each generation. It is another proof of healthy ageing. Unfortunately, that movement is also dependent on deprivation(See Newsletter #178). The improvements in healthy ageing do not accrue in areas of higher deprivation.

Personal Reassurance.

I was born and grew up in an area of the UK that now ranks as one of the worst for deprivation. Did my first fifteen years ruin my health and life expectancy?

The researchers looked at changes to social standing. Those changes can have a measurable impact on biological ageing. Some people progress from low social advantage in early in life to high later. They had more favourable protein concentrations. This was relative to those whose circumstances had not improved.