Eight years ago, President Barack Obama looked fresh-faced and young, now he looks like someone's
pop-pop.
Does holding the highest office in the land age people faster?
Hey village elders, Trace here for DNews.
The President of the United States of America is likely one of the most stressful jobs around,
on-call 24 hours a day, constantly visible by the world's media, citizens, and of course,
enemies.
Being the Leader of the Free World is bound to take it's toll after four or eight years.
Commonly, people cite pictures of presidents and how greyer, or aged they end up looking.
Obama quipped to the fresh faced Canadian PM Justin Trudeau, "if you don’t want to
go grey like me, you need to start dying [your hair] soon before it’s too late!"
But DO presidents age faster?
Today, the president never goes anywhere without the Physician to the President, and meticulous
records of the president's health care, of course, kept.
So, Dr. Michael Roizen (chief wellness officer at the Cleveland Clinic) looked at records
from every president from Teddy Roosevelt to George W. Bush to find a pattern, and he
thinks, "presidents age twice as fast."
Roizen looked at the Commanders in Chief's diet, blood pressure, physical activity, and
lifestyle finding the level chronic stress was high, and the ability to blow off steam
with friends and family (which would lessen stress) was low.
Stress has huge effects on the human body!
Things like immune system response, cardiovascular function, motivation and mood, not to mention
how your body processes food and how much fat you store are all worsened by stress,
and… it also affects aging.
A study in Nature Genetics found chronic exposure to stress will shorten telomeres.
Telomeres are a chunk of DNA on the end of each of our chromosomes, think...
the things on the tips of your shoelaces (called aglets, btw).
As they replicate, the telomeres shrink, and the DNA eventually becomes more easily damaged!
Scientists think this is what causes aging.
And according to many studies, stress increases the telomere shortening process!
And thus, increases the speed of aging!
The thing is, Roizen is just one opinion.
Another doctor, Jay Olshansky of the University of Illinois-Chicago, disagrees with him.
Olshansky believed wealth, education and healthcare-access all increase presidential lifespan.
And modern-day presidents definitely have those.
Is incredible how much wealth, education and healthcare access helps people live longer,
healthier lives, amirite?
But, what if they're both right?
What if because of chronic stress while in the White House, presidents age faster, but
then because of their access to wealth and health care -- they live "better" lives after
their terms end?
This may be true… but, according to a study in the British Medical Journal they die sooner.
Researchers tracked how many years they lived AFTER a candidate's last election.
279 national leaders in 17 countries from 1722 until 2015 were studied and researchers
found: elected leaders lived 4.4 fewer years than their unelected brethren.
Yikes.
One thing is without a doubt, over the last eight years, Barack Obama is getting greyer
up top.
In fact, a study in Proceedings of the Natural Institute of Science compared his hair over
time.
They found, he was, in fact, getting greyer at point-452 percent more per year (when compared
to actor Morgan Freeman).
Science is so awesome.
Look, there have only been 44 presidents so far, and only a handful alive at any given
time.
To study them as a group is reallllly difficult, and it might just all be in our heads.
According to Dr. Olshansky, Obama is not necessarily aging faster, we just notice because he's
ALWAYS out there.
We are watching him change, so when we see an old picture it is just… a shock.
See?
Crazy, right?