Thursday, June 30, 2005

Smoking and obesity 'age people'

Being overweight and a smoker makes a person biologically older than slim non-smokers of the same birth age, UK and US researchers have found.

Smoking accelerated the ageing of key pieces of a person's DNA by about 4.6 years. For obesity it was nine years.

These genetic codes are important for regulating cell division and have been linked to age-related diseases.

The study in the Lancet was based on 1,122 twins from a database held by St Thomas' Hospital in London.

Source - BBC News

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