Nir Barzilai1,*, James C Appleby2, Steven N Austad3, Ana Maria Cuervo1, Matt Kaeberlein4, Christian Gonzalez-Billault5,6, Stephanie Lederman7, Ilia Stambler8,*, Felipe Sierra9,*
1Institute for Aging Research, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, New York, NY, USA 2Gerontological Society of America, USA 3Department of Biology, University of Alabama at Birmingham, USA 4Department of Pathology, University of Washington, USA 5Geroscience Center for Brain Health and Metabolism (GERO), Chile 6The Buck Institute for Research on Aging, USA 7American Federation for Aging Research, USA 8Vetek (Seniority) Association - the Movement for Longevity and Quality of Life, Israel 9National Institute on Aging, NIH, USA
The data on COVID-19 is clear on at least one point: Older adults are most vulnerable to hospitalization, disability and death following infection with the novel coronavirus. Therefore, therapeutically addressing degenerative aging processes as the main risk factors appears promising for tackling the present crisis and is expected to be relevant when tackling future infections, epidemics and pandemics. Therefore, utilizing a geroscience approach, targeting aging processes to prevent multimorbidity, via initiating broad clinical trials of potential geroprotective therapies, is recommended.
Wu Z, McGoogan JM (2020). Characteristics of and important lessons from the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) outbreak in China: summary of a report of 72 314 cases from the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention. JAMA, 323(13):1239-1242.
[2]
Miller RA (2002). Extending life: scientific prospects and political obstacles. Milbank Q, 80:155-174.
[3]
Sierra F, Kohanski P (2017). Geroscience and the trans-NIH Geroscience Interest Group, GSIG. Geroscience, 39(1):1-5.
[4]
López-Otín C, Blasco MA, Partridge L, Serrano M, Kroemer G (2013). The hallmarks of aging. Cell, 153(6):1194-1217.
[5]
Kennedy BK, Berger SL, Brunet A, Campisi J, Cuervo AM, Epel ES, et al. (2014). Geroscience: linking aging to chronic disease. Cell, 159:709-713.
[6]
Longo VD, Antebi A, Bartke A, Barzilai N, Brown-Borg HM, Caruso C, et al. (2015). Interventions to slow aging in humans: are we ready? Aging Cell, 14(4):497-510.
[7]
Kaeberlein M, Rabinovitch PS, Martin GM (2015). Healthy aging: the ultimate preventative medicine. Science, 350(6265):1191-1193.
[8]
Aw D, Silva AB, Palmer DB (2007). Immunosenescence: emerging challenges for an ageing population. Immunology, 120(4):435-446.
[9]
Kulkarni AS, Gubbi S, Barzilai N (2020). Benefits of metformin in attenuating the hallmarks of aging. Cell Metab, in press.
[10]
Barzilai N, Crandall JP, Kritchevsky SB, Espeland MA (2016). Metformin as a tool to target aging. Cell Metab, 23:1060-1065.
[11]
Bailey CJ (2017). Metformin: historical overview. Diabetologia, 60(9):1566-1576.
[12]
Diaz A, Romero M, Vazquez T, Lechner S, Blomberg BB, Frasca D (2017). Metformin improves in vivo and in vitro B cell function in individuals with obesity and Type-2 Diabetes. Vaccine, 35(20):2694-2700.
[13]
Luo P, Qiu L, Liu Y, Liu XL, Zheng JL, Xue HY, et al. (2020). Metformin treatment was associated with decreased mortality in COVID-19 patients with diabetes in a retrospective analysis. Am J Trop Med Hyg, in press.
[14]
Bramante C, Ingraham N, Murray T, Marmor S, Hoversten S, Gronski J, et al. (2020). Observational study of metformin and risk of mortality in patients hospitalized with Covid-19. MedRxiv, in press.
[15]
Chen C, Liu Y, Liu Y, Zheng P (2009). mTOR regulation and therapeutic rejuvenation of aging hematopoietic stem cells. Sci Signal, 2(98):ra75.
[16]
Mannick JB, Del Giudice G, Lattanzi M, Valiante NM, Praestgaard J, Huang B, et al. (2014). mTOR inhibition improves immune function in the elderly. Sci Transl Med, 6:268ra179.
[17]
Mannick JB, Morris M, Hockey HP, Roma G, Beibel M, Kulmatycki K, et al. (2018). TORC1 inhibition enhances immune function and reduces infections in the elderly. Sci Transl Med, 10:eaaq1564.
[18]
Kraig E, Linehan LA, Liang H, Romo TQ, Liu Q, Wu Y, et al. (2018). A randomized control trial to establish the feasibility and safety of rapamycin treatment in an older human cohort: immunological, physical performance, and cognitive effects. Exp Gerontol, 105:53-69.
Moskalev A, Stambler I, Caruso C (2020). Innate and adaptive immunity in aging and longevity: the foundation of resilience. Aging Dis, in press.
[21]
Belsky DW, Caspi A, Houts R, Cohen HJ, Corcoran DL, Danese A, et al. (2015). Quantification of biological aging in young adults. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA, 112(30):E4104-4110.
[22]
Yang J, Zheng Y, Gou X, Pu K, Chen Z, Guo Q, et al. (2020). Prevalence of comorbidities and its effects in patients infected with SARS-CoV-2: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Int J Infect Dis, 94:91-95.
[23]
Richardson S, Hirsch JS, Narasimhan M, Crawford JM, McGinn T, Davidson KW, the Northwell COVID-19 Research Consortium. (2020). Presenting characteristics, comorbidities, and outcomes among 5700 patients hospitalized with COVID-19 in the New York City area. JAMA, 323(20):2052-2059.
[24]
Vaduganathan M, Vardeny O, Michel T, McMurray JJV, Pfeffer MA, Solomon SD (2020). Renin-Angiotensin-Aldosterone system inhibitors in patients with Covid-19. New Engl J Med, 382(17):1653-1659.
[25]
Newman JC, Milman S, Hashmi SK, Austad SN, Kirkland JL, Halter JB, Barzilai N (2016). Strategies and challenges in clinical trials targeting human aging. J Gerontol A Biol Sci Med Sci, 71:1424-1434.
[26]
Stambler I (2017). Recognizing degenerative aging as a treatable medical condition: methodology and policy. Aging Dis, 8(5):583-589.
[27]
Ferrucci L, Gonzalez-Freire M, Fabbri E, Simonsick E, Tanaka T, Moore Z, et al. (2020). Measuring biological aging in humans: a quest. Aging Cell, 19(2):e13080.
[28]
Jin K, Simpkins JW, Ji X, Leis M, Stambler I (2015). The critical need to promote research of aging and aging-related diseases to improve health and longevity of the elderly population. Aging Dis, 6(1):1-5.
[29]
Stambler I, Jin K, Lederman S, Barzilai N, Olshansky SJ, Omokaro E, et al. (2018). Aging health and R&D for healthy longevity must be included into the WHO Work Program. Aging Dis, 9(2):331-333.