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AbstractRecent studies of old-age mortality trends assess whether longevity improvements over time are linked to increasing compression of mortality at advanced ages. The historical backdrop of these studies is the long-term improvement in a population's socioeconomic resources that fueled longevity gains. We extend this line of inquiry by examining whether socioeconomic differences in longevity within a population are accompanied by old-age mortality compression. Specifically, we document educational differences in longevity and mortality compression for older men and women in the United States. Drawing on the fundamental cause of disease framework, we hypothesize that both longevity and compression increase with higher levels of education and that women with the highest levels of education will exhibit the greatest degree of longevity and compression. Results based on the Health and Retirement Study and the National Health Interview Survey Linked Mortality File confirm a strong educational gradient in both longevity and mortality compression. We also find that mortality is more compressed within educational groups among women than men. The results suggest that educational attainment in the United States maximizes life chances by delaying the biological aging process.

Research on religiosity and health has generally focussed on the United States, and outcomes of health or mortality but not both. Using the European Values Survey 2008, we examined cross-sectional associations between four dimensions of religiosity/spirituality: attendance, private prayer, importance of religion, belief in God; and healthy life expectancy (HLE) based on self-reported health across 47 European countries (n = 65,303 individuals). Greater levels of private prayer, importance of religion and belief in God, at a country level, were associated with lower HLE at age 20, after adjustment for confounders, but only in women. The findings may explain HLE inequalities between European countries.

AbstractChina is aging rapidly, and the number of Chinese elderly with dementia is expected to rise. This paper projects, up to year 2060, the number of Chinese elderly within four distinct cognitive states. A multi‐state population model was developed using system dynamics and parametrized with age–gender‐specific transition rates (between intact, mild, moderate and severe cognitive impairment and death) estimated from two waves (2012 and 2014) of a community‐based cohort of elderly in China aged ≥65 years (N = 1824). Probabilistic sensitivity analysis and the bootstrap method was used to obtain the 95% confidence interval of the transition rates. The number of elderly with any degree of cognitive impairment increases; with severe cognitive impairment increasing the most, at 698%. Among elderly with cognitive impairment, the proportion of very old elderly (age ≥ 80) is expected to rise from 53% to 78% by 2060. This will affect the demand for social and health services China.Copyright © 2017 System Dynamics Society