Millennials, you’re old: why age is catching up with them faster than boomers

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Experts suggest this is the case not just in the United States, but in Asia too.

Millennials are developing chronic conditions, including hypertension, much earlier than their parents did. Photo: Shutterstock

Korean millennials on track to age faster than their parents

Professor Jung Hee-won, of the geriatric medicine department at Asan Medical Centre in Seoul, South Korea, warns that young adults are on track to be the first generation to age faster than their parents.

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“People who are in their 30s and 40s are susceptible to age-related diseases that people in their 50s and 60s would normally experience,” Jung says. “This means they are at a greater risk of long-term chronic conditions such as obesity, diabetes, cancer and heart disease” – all of which can speed up the ageing process.

Jung said a number of factors contribute to this, such as overconsumption of readily available processed foods, including foods with added sugar; physical inactivity; stress; poor work-life balance; and financial difficulties.

Many studies have linked obesity with accelerated ageing, in part because obesity contributes to the DNA damage that occurs with ageing.

Millennials in general are more health conscious than previous generations, but people in this group who eat too much unhealthy food risk obesity and diseases such as diabetes that are life-shortening. Photo: Shutterstock

A nationwide study by the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency showed more than half of men in their 30s and 40s (54.9 per cent of those in their 30s and 54.2 per cent of those in their 40s) were obese – having a body mass index of more than 25 – in 2021.

Before the Covid-19 pandemic, the prevalence of obesity in this age group was slightly lower, at 48.9 per cent and 46.2 per cent, respectively.

While the obesity rate in women is not as high as in men – 19 per cent of women in their 30s and 19.7 per cent of those in their 40s, in 2022 – many women are “skinny fat”, Jung says. They have a relatively high percentage of body fat and a lack of muscle on their arms and legs.

Professor Jung Hee-won warns that young adults are on track to be the first generation to age faster than their parents. Photo: Jung Hee-won

Hong Kong millennials unsatisfied with overall health

Au Yeung Tung-wai, an adjunct associate professor at the Jockey Club Institute of Ageing at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, says there is a growing number of young adults whose biological age – the age of their cells – is greater than their chronological age, the number of years they have lived.

“From my everyday encounters with people and through grip-strength measurement, I think it could be true that millennials may be weaker than their parents [were at] the same age,” he said.

Professor Au Yeung Tung-wai is an adjunct associate professor at the Jockey Club Institute of Ageing at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. Photo: Au Yeung Tung-wai

He, too, sees age-associated conditions such as obesity and diabetes developing earlier than before.

The reason?

“In the past, we had to walk and do a lot of physical activities. But after the rapid economic growth in the 1970s, people are working out less and they spend a high proportion of leisure time on social media instead of doing physical activities.”

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The findings of a 2022 survey for health insurer Bupa in Hong Kong of 500 millennials aged 25-40 underscore that young adults are not prioritising their health, even though they know they should.

More than six in 10 questioned considered themselves to be health conscious – but fewer than half (48 per cent) were satisfied with their overall health.

Over half (53 per cent) said they do not have enough time to maintain a healthy lifestyle – and 45 per cent reported engaging in physical exercise less than once a week.

Nearly half (48 per cent) believed stress keeps them from being healthier, and said they commonly report office-linked ailments such as shoulder and neck pain, excessive eye strain and headaches.

Millennials are on track to be the first generation to age faster than their parents, in part because of poor work-life balance and stress. Photo: Shutterstock

How to safeguard health

Experts offer several ways for young adults to maintain their health.

“The key to reversing accelerated ageing [is] your lifestyle. You have to remodel your life and manage ‘intrinsic capacity’,” Jung says, referring to the combination of an individual’s physical and mental capacities.

He said this could be done through managing four “Ms”:

  • mobility – walking a lot;

  • medical issues – taking preventive measures such as eating healthily and being active, and getting regular medical check-ups;

  • mentation – meditating, and being focused in the present; and

  • what matters – setting top priorities in life.

Au Yeung stresses the importance of building muscles to “help you have less chance of fracture when you grow old”.

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Singapore exemplifies society’s role in promoting healthy ageing

Reshma Merchant is an associate professor in the department of medicine at the National University of Singapore. She highlights one long-term economic implication of accelerated ageing in younger people, who she says are more lonely, anxious and sedentary than their parents’ generation was at the same age.

“If the prevalence of chronic diseases goes up, there’s going to be a loss of productivity as well.”

Reshma Merchant is an associate professor in the Department of Medicine at the National University of Singapore. Photo: Reshma Merchant
People use a walking trail in Singapore, part of a network that links up its many parks and encourages a more active lifestyle. Photo: Shutterstock
That is why she lauds the government’s efforts to increase public awareness of healthy ageing, and to deem Singapore an engineered “Blue Zone 2.0” – with policies aimed at keeping people active, socially engaged and choosing healthier food options.

Blue zones are regions in the world where people are observed to live, or to have recently lived, longer than average. These include Sardinia in Italy, Okinawa prefecture in Japan, the Nicoya Peninsula in Costa Rica, Icaria in Greece, and Loma Linda in the US state of California.

In Singapore, well-established walking trails and cycling tracks that run from coast to coast, across and around the island, and link up the city’s many parks, have helped encourage an active lifestyle, Merchant says, as has providing exercise equipment in parks.

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The government also cut permitted sugar levels in sweetened drinks and introduced a four-level Nutri-Grade labelling system, based on the sugar and saturated fat content in beverages – to help Singaporeans make healthier choices.

Merchant, who is in her fifties, suggests two main remedies to pre-empt age-related diseases that she uses herself: exercising and eating well.

“I go to the gym twice a week to do resistance exercise and burn calories. I also take vitamins like coenzyme Q10, cod liver oil and probiotics. The Mediterranean diet, fresh berries and broccoli help reduce saturated fat,” she says.

“After doing this actively over 18 months, all my aches and pains went away.”

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