Isle of Man resident Jim Mellon is renowned for his predictions about the future, writes Julie Blackburn in the latest Lunch With . . . series in Business News.
His current concern – and the subject of his latest book - is longevity.
If you thought that ‘anti-ageing’ was some kind of cream that gave you less wrinkles – well, you’re just not on the same page here.
What Jim is talking about is far more radical: nothing less than the possibility of increasing human lifespan far beyond anything previously imagined…
‘It’s the biggest thing that’s ever happened in the history of the world…’
This is nothing if not a bold claim but the man who is making it - Jim Mellon – has a very respectable record when it comes to predicting trends and their consequences.
He did, after all, write ‘Wake Up: Survive and Prosper in the Coming Economic Turmoil’ in 2005, warning us of the impending global financial crash.
His latest book concerns longevity and the far-reaching effects of humankind massively extending what we have traditionally thought of as our allotted lifespan.
It’s three days before Christmas and Jim and I are sitting in Samphire, on Douglas North Quay, surrounded by the clink and chatter of festive diners around us.
Jim is enjoying the smoked haddock omelette while I’m tucking into a wild mushroom risotto – both excellent. We also each have a glass of white wine in front of us, which Jim firmly believes is good for you: ‘I have a glass of white wine every day – except in January when I don’t drink at all – then I go on to red wine because it’s better for you,’ he says.
He is also keen to tell me, and I’m happy to hear, that the sugar in wine doesn’t count as it has all turned to alcohol – music to my ears.
The sugar thing is important because, as you can discover when Jim’s book comes out at the end of March, sugar – and having high blood sugar levels - is a big, big baddy when it comes to ageing.
So much so that Jim, along with a number of medical professionals and others seeking to hold back the years, routinely takes a low dose of the drug metformin, more usually prescribed to people with Type 2 diabetes, to keep blood sugar levels low.
He also recommends taking a mini aspirin each day: ‘It reduces your risk of heart attack by 50 per cent and stroke by 80 per cent – and you should take it at night because most people have heart attacks at night. It’s also highly protective against some forms of cancers,’ he tells me.
He adds that a number of eminent doctors in the anti-ageing field claim that you can live longer – maybe an extra five years - by following a very low calorie diet.
But all this is tinkering around the edges: Jim’s vision of extending life expectancy is far more ambitious, as he explains: ‘In 1900 a 20 year-old woman had a lesser chance of her mother still being alive than a 20 year old woman today having all her grandparents alive. The life expectancy was 49 - today it’s in the 80s, depending on where you live, and a child born today has a 50 per cent chance of living to over 100.
‘The reason for that is because of better sanitation; more effective treatment for cancer; lower cardiac death rates, and less bacterial infection - though there’s antibiotic resistance now so that’s a bit of a problem - but generally a whole accumulation of things is leading to longer life spans.
‘But no one is living to over 120 - we haven’t broken that barrier because there’s something that’s making us die.’
That something is related to the way that wear and tear builds up in our DNA but research around the world is increasing our knowledge in this field and Jim believes a breakthrough is not far off.
This is not just wishful thinking on his part: his research has seen him poring over scientific papers and magazine articles and speaking to doctors and ‘KOLs’ – Key Opinion Leaders – around the world.
‘The people that I’ve been talking to are saying we’re not programmed to die: if you alter some of the pathways that contribute to DNA damage, you can extend life,’ he explains.
There is some exciting research being done on mice and fruit flies, chosen because their DNA has a close affinity to that of humans, whilst their lifespan is short enough to make it viable to monitor any extension within reasonable time scales. The research involves switching around some genes – something you can’t yet do in humans – and it is extending the life of these creatures by 40-50 per cent. And not just extending it, but doing so with no diminution of health:
‘So you go to the end of your life, if you’re a mouse, and you die, but you’re in a healthy state, you’re not dribbling away in the equivalent of a mouse nursing home or suffering from Alzheimers.
‘The aim is to be ‘wellderly’ as opposed elderly. The fact is that people over 70 normally get some health complication, then they get another one and another one, and by the time they get to 90 life’s a burden to many of them,’ Jim explains.
His research leads him to believe that this is set to change:
‘There’s never been the quantity of knowledge that we have today and, even if Donald Trump’s a bad president or the European Union implodes, or whatever, that’s just a short term economic thing. We have an accumulation of knowledge and the internet is allowing that knowledge to flow freely across borders, so academic collaboration is much more powerful.
‘That’s why I’ve got no doubt that in five or 10 years’ time we’ll have the answer to how we will live longer.’
So, we will be able to live another 50 years, whilst still being in good health – what’s not to like?
Actually, when you really think about it, the implications are massively far reaching, hence Jim’s assertion that it will be ‘the biggest thing that’s ever happened in the history of the world’, and he explains why:
‘If you can live to 150, you probably want to live to 200 or 300 or 400, and if you can do that then everything about our lives changes: you wouldn’t go to school at five and leave at 18; you wouldn’t retire at 65 - obviously because you’d still have another 300 years to live. So, when - not if - that happens it will have very serious implications for the world we live in.’
Jim’s main purpose in writing his books is not just to look at future trends but to find investment opportunities that exploit the way the world looks likely to pan out and, as he says: ‘There have been many books on how to live longer but none that relate to the investment opportunity.’
Savvy investments have helped to take Jim to Number 135 in the Sunday Times Rich List, with an estimated wealth of £850 million. He is also one of the largest employers on the island, as the owner of the Claremont Hotel and executive chairman of Manx Financial Group PLC which includes Conister Bank and Edgewater Associates.
As such, he is always keen to promote the Isle of Man, and see it prosper. He is known for being very pro-Brexit – he had been interviewed about it on the Today programme on Radio Four a few days earlier – and he sees it as a positive thing for the island too, as he says:
‘I would have thought Brexit is going to be great for the Isle of Man.
‘From the point of view of financial services, the Isle of Man could do well out of it because, post Brexit, there’ll be a lot of people in Singapore, Hong Kong and around the world who regard us as being a more interesting centre without being controlled by Europe. I think the Isle of Man could have a good growth spurt if they seize the opportunity.
‘But I also think they need to do something else and I keep on telling them do something in the biosciences or in the healthcare sector.’
He will be speaking again at next year’s ISLEXPO event. The subject will, naturally, be longevity: ‘Because most people don’t realise this is the greatest technological advance in the world and we’re lucky because it could be realised. It’s not snake oil in the 19th century - this is possible.’
Of course, even with advances in medical science, we will still have to put in a bit of effort ourselves to benefit in terms of living longer, healthier lives. This was highlighted recently by the much-publicised Public Health England report which stated that: ‘Modern life is harming the health of the nation’. An estimated 77 per cent of men and 63 per cent of women in middle age are overweight or obese and the number developing lifestyle diseases, especially Type 2 diabetes, is rising exponentially.
‘We’re doing everything we can on the planet to squander the advantages of healthcare improvements by lifestyle issues such as bad food, lack of exercise and excessive drinking – it’s quite sad actually,’ Jim says.
So his parting advice to all of us is: ‘Stay healthy and wait for the breakthroughs to come.’
I have an even more appropriate one for him: ‘Live long and prosper!’