Human longevity or lifespan has been on the rise for a few centuries now. For this, we have to thank the discovery and practices of modern medicine, especially its use of vaccines and antibiotics that fight infectious diseases, as well as its unparalleled services in emergency medicine that save lives.

But we also find references in ancient scriptures of a long bygone era where humans used to live well past their hundreds or even a few hundreds of years. Whether such references are literally true or not, it is a fact that even now in India and many pockets of the world, among tribals, there are more instances of people living well past their hundreds, without any help from modern medicine.

What these seemingly contrasting observations are revealing is a set of interesting facts. Firstly, there is a huge potential among humans to live much longer than what be commonly seen today. Secondly, modern life and the unhealthy changes it brought about in food, sedentary hours, stress, pollution & sleep loss, seems to have taken a serious toll on modern human lifespan.

While the modern medical practices that I mentioned above like vaccines, antibiotics & emergency medicine have improved the lifespan of those who are living their lives in this modern way, this improvement is at best a 15% progress, typically extending the average lifespan from the mid-70s to the mid-80s, and nothing much more.

There is also another more important reason why this kind of extension in lifespan is rather lacklustre. It invariably comes with a poorer quality of life, at least during the last 25% of the years, from the early 60s to the mid-80s, due to the mounting health issues from a few lifestyle diseases like type 2 diabetes, hypertension, cardiovascular diseases, and cancer or organ failures.

In other words, this increase in lifespan doesn’t come with a proportionate increase in health span or the number of truly healthy years in people’s lives. The primary reason for this is the lack of healthy ageing due to the development of such lifestyle diseases, and secondly, due to the lack of holistic prevention and management of these lifestyle diseases in modern medicine.

Just a quick example would explain this. A type 2 diabetes diagnosis is followed by a prescription for lifelong daily pills that either increase insulin secretion temporarily or decrease insulin resistance of cells temporarily. This is purely an ad hoc measure that lasts only a few hours, that doesn’t do anything permanently or incrementally to correct what caused or triggered diabetes, which means it has to be repeated once or twice a day, for life.

Instead, what would really help a diabetes patient to control their disease holistically is lifestyle modifications across diet, nutrition, sleep, exercise, yoga, meditation, breathe work, de-stressing etc. Of course, if your doctor has prescribed you medicines you should be taking it. But without all-round lifestyle modifications too, your diabetes and its complications are only destined to worsen.

Such comprehensive lifestyle management is the very best of biohacking strategies available today. They are based on research-validated lifestyle modifications, and their real power is that they are not only effective in controlling the diseases, but in keeping the diseases at bay. In other words, years or even decades before such a killer lifestyle disease is about to strike, people can start defending against it.

But how to know whether you have an elevated risk for developing type 2 diabetes? Two biohacking strategies can come in handy here. The first is to undergo a detailed genetic test that can reveal your genetic susceptibilities for developing various lifestyle diseases. Secondly, it can be matched and analysed with a comprehensive metabolic assessment, which will improve the accuracy of the prediction, by eliminating false positives.

Today, biohacking systems like EPLIMO that combine such genetic and metabolic tests into one easily usable solution are available even in India. EPLIMO’s advanced geno-metabolic screening using AI based tools can detect risks for developing any among 250+ common and rare lifestyle diseases, and suggest personalised lifestyle modifications spanning diet, nutrition, supplements, sleep, exercise, yoga, meditation, breath work, de-stressing, detoxing etc. that can help keep these detected disease risks at bay.

These personalised lifestyle modifications, when undertaken properly and regularly, unleash epigenetic changes at the cellular level, which means it changes the expression or triggering of various disease-encoding genes without actually making DNA level changes. Lifestyle diseases usually occur when such hard-coded genetic risks get triggered by faulty lifestyle or environmental factors.

Such personalised epigenetic changes promote not only longevity or lifespan, but healthy ageing and protection from lifestyle diseases that results in proportionate health span or years of healthy life. Pleasant side-effects like high energy levels, sharpened focus and peak performance also happen in those who diligently follow such biohacking systems.

There are also virtual biohacking communities like Limoverse that enthusiasts can join for multiple benefits. This first ever blockchain based health and wellness ecosystem & metaverse is a meeting ground of wellness seekers and wellness providers in different specialities from the world over. Limoverse also has powerful programs like HealthFi Burn2Earn that rewards users with crypto tokens into their wallets in proportion to the calories they burn while exercising, which is measured using wearable health trackers like smartwatches or wrist bands.

Guest Author - Sajeev Nair, Founder & Chairman, Vieroots Wellness Solutions