HEALTHY AT 100
By John Robbins
Random House, New York 2006
Reviewed by Margaret Setter

Imagine how it would be to live in a society whose members live to an advanced age, perhaps 100 years or more, while enjoying good physical health and unimpaired mental faculties, almost to the end. Picture a society where children are treated with respect, never shouted at or smacked, but are well behaved and disciplined, and love and respect their elders in return.

In Healthy at 100, John Robbins paints a picture of four such societies; the Hunza of north Pakistan, Abkhasians of the Caucasus, Vilcabambans of Ecuador, and the Japanese Okinawans. These are materially poor societies, where nature’s gifts are sparse, and there can be no concept of retirement. People work physically hard, in many cases well into their nineties, because they must.

Diets vary from place to place but share one common factor. They are high in fresh fruit and vegetables and whole grains supplemented by tiny amounts of eggs, meat or fish. Work rhythms reflect body rhythms. Although they work hard, these indigenous people are not subject to stress. There is a strong element of cooperation. A high value is placed on human relationships, irrespective of age.

Such societies offer a strong contrast to western-style affluent societies where by the time people are 70 they are commonly suffering two or more degenerative diseases. Although we’ve added nearly thirty years to the average life expectancy, our aging can often become a source of grief and anxiety, plagued by diabetes, osteoporosis, cancer and other diseases brought on by loneliness and a diet rich in saturated fats, sugar and refined cereals from which the vitamins and minerals have been extracted.

The prevailing culture celebrates youthfulness. We fear and attempt to deny the reality that each and every one of us is growing older day by day. According to Robbins, by 2040, it is estimated that 5.5 million Americans, more than the current population of Denmark, will live in nursing homes, while another 12 million will require ongoing home care services.

The United States is the wealthiest and most powerful nation the world has ever seen but wealth and power of themselves do not bring happiness. From its inception as a nation, violence in many forms has been a constant force in American society. Violence has been invoked against indigenous people, African Americans, workers attempting to organise, women and children. Currently, “565,000 children are killed or suffer serious injuries at the hands of parents or guardians each year”.

Robbins is convinced this situation can be changed: “Who you will become in your later years is shaped by all the choices you make, all the ways you care for yourself, how you manage your life, even how you think, from your earliest years”. Diet and exercise, positive human relationships, are the key to a long healthy life.

Millions of Americans do not conform to the stereotype of violence and greed. Robbins sketches in the outlines of some of those Americans, who have resisted or overcome social alienation. One such moral exemplar is Doris Haddock, popularly known as “Granny D”, born in 1910. Granny D led a busy and productive life devoted to many good causes, especially those relating to democracy, peace and nuclear disarmament. In 1960 she played an important part in preventing the planned use of hydrogen bombs in Alaska.

In 2004, she became the Democratic candidate for the US Senate from New Hampshire, proclaiming a strong anti-war message. Aged 90, she walked for fourteen months across America, meeting people, urging them to exercise their democratic rights and register for the vote. Spokespersons from both major US political parties hailed this fabulous woman as a national icon. Her inspiring life is just one of many celebrated by Robbins in this book.

Robbins is convinced that love and strong social relationships are the key to a healthy fulfilling life, more important even, than good nutrition and exercise. “Loneliness kills faster than cigarettes”. As examples he cites valuable summaries of medical and anthropological studies of small groups, often composed of very ill individuals, whose physical and mental health improved in proportion as they entered into co-operative relationships with one another.

Although their diseases eventually killed them, each one while still alive, extended themselves and each other, through the exchange of love and esteem, “fostered in relationships of mutual trust and group solidarity”.

I am sure every reader who purchases Healthy At 100, will treasure it for its intelligence, and affirmation of life along all dimensions; physical, emotional, and spiritual. “In Okinawa, Abkhasia, Vilcabamba, and Hunza, there is a deep sense of human connection and social integrity. Wealth is shared rather than hoarded”. In our society, this may be an unattainable goal, at least for the moment. It should not prevent us from reaching out to people, regardless of our age or condition. Every one of us has at least some capacity to explore the untapped and dormant possibilities we possess as human beings.

Our common task is foster the sense of a common responsibility for each other and this gorgeous little planet that is our common home. “Whether we acknowledge it or not, we all have a choice to be either accomplices in the status quo or everyday revolutionaries. We have a choice whether to succumb to the cultural trance, eat fast food, and race by each other in the night, or to build lives of caring, substance, and healing”.

I suggest you read this book with care; keeping it close for constant reference. The path ahead will present many obstacles to overcome but if we persist we may well succeed in mounting the counterforce so necessary to heal our ailing societies and the planet.