Anti-Aging Drug

An anti-aging drug that is purported to allow people to live well into their 100s is scheduled to enter human clinical trials in 2016. If successful, it may prove to be the most important medical intervention of the modern era.

Originally developed for diabetics, it was recently found that patients with type 2 diabetes who were treated with the drug Metformin could live longer than people without diabetes. It has already been demonstrated to have anti-cancer and anti-cardiovascular disease properties, and can reduce the chance of developing diabetes in pre-diabetics by one third.

Metformin is actually one of the less expensive pharmaceuticals available, and works by allowing more oxygen to be released into the cells. Studies on mice showed that it increased their lifespan by 20 percent.

In 2012, the United Nations estimated that there are over 300,000 centenarians worldwide, however, that number is expected to increase quickly in the coming years. For example, the Office of National Statistics in the United Kingdom projected that one in three babies born in the U.K. in 2013 will live to be over 100 years old.