The coronavirus pandemic has highlighted the vulnerabilities of multi-morbidities and the importance of better health in older age.

Today the House of Lords Science and Technology Committee has published a report into healthy ageing following an in-depth inquiry. They found that:

• New Science has potential to improve healthy ageing benefiting the individual, the NHS and society
• UK is a global leader in drug development and new technologies with promising advances
• However, Government is missing its key healthy ageing targets and must act now
• Inequalities in healthy life expectancy are stark; COVID-19 has highlighted concerns
• Evidence that the rate of multi-morbidity is increasing; designated clinicians required

Professor Jesús Gil, Head of the Cell Proliferation group at the LMS, gave evidence at the House of Lords Science and Technology committee for this inquiry at the end of 2019. Speaking about the status of treatments that target cellular senescence for age-related disease. You can watch the video from the House of Lords here.

Responding to the findings from the report Professor Jesús Gil, Head of the Cell Proliferation group said:

“Cellular senescence has been shown to be one of several underlying processes affecting ageing. It is reassuring to see that the House of Lords have recognised the opportunity that we have to target these processes to treat multi-morbidities in a more efficient and safe way. I second their call for Government to increase the funding for research into the biological processes underlying ageing.”

Commenting on the report, Lord Patel, House of Lords Science and Technology Committee Chair said:

“The Committee found that the Government needs to urgently address the key issues of reducing health inequalities, implementing health system reforms and promoting lifestyle changes.

“The Government must therefore act now to increase support for the exciting new scientific research that targets the underlying processes of ageing. Treatments are being developed that could improve health without the need to treat multiple separate illnesses. Furthermore, technologies can be better utilised to help people live independently for longer.”

The full report from the committee can be found here.