Experts fear elderly billionaires will become immortal and compound their wealth and power

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Experts are airing concerns that deep-pocketed billionaires will soon be able to use their vast wealth to increase their lifespans – allowing them additional time to add on to their billions.

The scary hypothesis – which seems like something out of a science fiction novel – has been laid by an increasing amount of scientists in recent years, amid recent strides in anti-aging science.

Long just a pipe dream, the concept of a modern-day Methuselah – the biblical grandfather of Noah who lived to 969 – is becoming more and more likely.

That said, the concept of a driven mogul like Jeff Bezos and Bill Gates being blessed with an ever-lasting lifespan is not so appealing to some. 

Included in that camp is bioethicist Christopher Wareham, who believes such advances could ‘exacerbate all the kinds of existing inequalities that we have’ already.

Experts fear elderly billionaires will become immortal and compound their wealth and power

Microsoft founder Bill Gates

Experts are airing concerns that deep-pocketed billionaires such as Jeff Bezos and Bill Gates will soon be able to use their vast wealth to increase their lifespans – allowing them additional time to add on to their billions

Bioethicist Christopher Wareham, who studies aging at Utrecht University in the Netherlands warns that such advances could 'exacerbate all the kinds of existing inequalities that we have'

Bioethicist Christopher Wareham, who studies aging at Utrecht University in the Netherlands warns that such advances could ‘exacerbate all the kinds of existing inequalities that we have’ 

Speaking to The Financial Times Monday, Wareham – a professor at Utrecht University in the Netherlands – stated that while scientists now have a better handle on what causes us to get old, solutions such as cell-flushing vaccines and pricey, cure-all pills will remain out reach for the everyman.

‘Suppose, for example, we had a kind of vaccine for the pandemic of age,’ Wareham, who studies the ethics of aging, told The Times. 

‘This is going to potentially exacerbate all the kinds of existing inequalities that we have.

He warned that  such advances could create further disparity in an already divided nation.

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‘The longer you’re around, the more your wealth compounds,’ Wareham said. ‘And the wealthier you are, the more political influence you have.’ 

Long just a dream, the concept of a modern-day Methuselah (pictured) - the biblical figure who lived to 969 - is becoming more and more likely as advances in anti-aging continue to be made

Long just a dream, the concept of a modern-day Methuselah (pictured) – the biblical figure who lived to 969 – is becoming more and more likely as advances in anti-aging continue to be made

Wareharm is not alone in his concerns – as figures such as Bezos, 58, Israeli entrepreneur Yuri Milner, and Google co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin Funnel money into ventures meant to make deaths before 100 a thing of the past.

Other, older funders include Gates, 67, Richard Branson, 67, and Former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, 80, who have all provided prominent financial backup to companies investigating how to lengthen lives in recent years.

Progress, however, has been somewhat slow until – that is, until relatively recently, where breakthroughs in understanding what causes the aging process, such as damage to our DNA and proteins that misbehave because of outside alterations, have been gleaned by scientists in their quest for the proverbial fountain of youth.

Researchers in Cambridge, for instance, have successfully reprogrammed skin cells from people aged 38 and 53 – something scientists say could make them ‘younger’ by 30 years.

Google co-founder Sergey Brin Funnel

Google co-founder Larry Page

Google co-founders (from left) Sergey Brin Funnel and Larry Page are among several billionaires to throw money at ventures meant to increase humans’ life spans

The method rewinds the ageing clock further than previous reprogramming methods without damaging the cells.

Researchers say they are even able partly to restore functions that have been lost in older cells. 

While the research is still in its early stages, the findings could eventually revolutionize regenerative medicine, especially if it can be replicated in other cell types and other tissues in the body, the researchers claim. 

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 Another class treatments being billed as breakthrough by age scientists is ‘senolytics,’ which targets aged cells that biologists have tabbed as ‘senescent cells’ that seem to accumulate in our bodies as we age. 

Scientists have recently discovered that cells seem to drive the aging process – causing cancer and other disorders that become increasingly prevalent as we age.

Another class treatments being billed as breakthrough by age scientists is 'senolytics,' which targets aged cells that biologists have tabbed as 'senescent cells' that seem to accumulate in our bodies as we age

Another class treatments being billed as breakthrough by age scientists is ‘senolytics,’ which targets aged cells that biologists have tabbed as ‘senescent cells’ that seem to accumulate in our bodies as we age 

The method rewinds the ageing clock further than previous reprogramming methods without damaging the cells. This image, taken from an electron microscope, shows an individual cell

The method rewinds the ageing clock further than previous reprogramming methods without damaging the cells. This image, taken from an electron microscope, shows an individual cell

In studies involving animals, the removal of these cells, scientist have found, seems to slow the process down – with some positing that it could perhaps even reverse it.

 Currently, there are more than two dozen companies looking for safe and effective ways to get rid of these cells in people – the biggest being Unity Biotechnology, which was founded by Mayo Clinic scientists who have successfully used the treatments on mice

The company, which started only last year, has already raised hundreds of millions of high-profile investors including Bezos, one of its top backers.

While promising, the treatment remains experimental and largely inaccessible to most, though scientists like Wareham and Nir Barzilai – the director of the Institute for Aging Research at New York’s Albert Einstein College of Medicine – are saying that thanks to advances over the past year, humans may be able to undergo the treatment by the end of the year.

‘We are done with hope and promise. We are at the point between having promise and realising it,’ The Israeli-American scientist told The Financial Times this week, as other remain similarly hopeful.

Andrew Steele, a computational biologist and author of a new book on longevity, told DailMail.com that there is no biological reason humans can’t reach the age of 200. 

He believes the big breakthrough will come in the form of drugs that remove ‘zombie cells’ in the body, which are thought to be one of the main culprits of tissue and organ decay as we age.

Pills that flush these cells out of the body are already in human trials in and could be on the market in as little as 10 years, according to Steele, who believes Americans could make it to 150 with the help of the drugs.

Another field in particular that piques the interest of anti-aging scientists is the study of DNA of reptiles and other cold-blooded animals. 

Michigan State University experts have begun studying dozens different types of long-living reptiles and amphibians — including crocodiles, salamanders and turtles that can live as long as 120 years. The team hope they will uncover ‘traits’ that can also be targeted in humans.

Some experts, meanwhile,  think that eradicating the big killers – cancer, dementia and heart disease – could be the true key to longevity.

Others, such Warharm, have grappled with the ethical side of scientists’ search for an answer to the age-old question of aging, with 

Chief Executive of longevity nonprofit Hevolution Foundation Mehmood Khan, for example, telling The Times that his organization is only funding products that can be ‘democratized’ and made available to the masses.

‘If this is going to be a gazillion-dollars’ worth of treatment for a handful of people, it is of no interest.’

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