CURING OLD AGE

Hokitika Guardian, 27 March 1930, Page 3

CURING OLD AGE

YOUNG BLOOD INFUSION THEORY. ■ FATIGUE AND SENILITY. “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure,” says,tho adage; so to prevent old age, or to postpone it.s onset, is better' than to try to al-

leviate it after it has arrived. So says Dr H. Jaworski* in an article contributed to “L’Bre Nouvelje” (Paris). -Still, there are now methods for achieving the latter result, some of which have been widely advertised, as well as one for which the author himself is responsible. They have sometimes succeeded, and often failed. Dr Jaworski 'believes that what lias already been accomplished is only a step toward what is ultimately possible. He reminds us that old -age is really a sort of fatigue, and that (to relieve it is quite a different thing from the actual prolongation of life. He writes as follows: “To grow young again is not necessarily to prolong life. It is to struggle against the infirmities of age and iiva certain degree to prolong the vital activity. Old age is fatiip is falling, little- bjy little, into decrepitude, to feel inconvenience

i,.' in scorn fort* accumulating: in a word, it is disintegration. And no •one can help wanting to be young

again. The automobile, the telephone, the radio, the ldnema and many other modern inventions, bring on additional fatigues, which affect our nervous systems in a notable; degree. We live in a vei'v different 'rhythm, and a day in 1930 is perhaps equivalent to ten of the -thirteenth Vfintiiry.

“In the morning, the* daily paper stimulates one by making him a pat - 'itieipant in the doings of the whole world, and in the 'evening the radio echoes through his home after a day of lb us i ness and consultation interrupted frequently by the telephone. MANY ROMANCES.

“Many romances about rejuvenation have appeared in recent years. Ihe authors with enviable imagination have seen the prdbiem as solved, and .they have woven their engaging tales about the inconveniences and the disagreeable features of, old age made young again. “This is going a little too last. In reality we are very far from these dreams and the problems that the,\ raise. Besides, the fundamental object of rejuvenation is not to restore youth to the aged hut to prevent people from becoming old, “Growing old is getting tired, as we have, said, and fatigue uses u-p the organs. This action varies much with individuals, and especially with age. There are old men of forty and young ones of sixty. People seventy years old may have excellent eyesight, while their teeth have failed. Others begin to grow old in their hearing, while with others still, the sexual appetite diminishes, or sleep is difficult.

“In fine, fatigue causes exhaustion, but we must recognise that' this fatigue is accentuated here or- thei e by had local conditions, duo' prof mbly to toxic influences.

DIFFERENT METHODS. “However this may be, and without being able to get to the root ot the matter, the num'Per of serious methods proposed for rejuvenation is at present five. “Steinach’s method has given good results, especially with himself and his pupils, while other operators have failed. Voronoff transplants portions of the glands .of monkeys. His results are often brilliant and durable, hut the operation has certain inconvenient features, and is not easy to repeat in ease of failure. “Dopier, a Viennese physician, lias observed that the spermatic artery, as it ages, is invaded Ihv small filaments which tend to contract it. Bv treatment with strong carbolic acid, the operator destroys these and restores the artery. “Tlio result appear" to last <m!y about a year, and the operation should be performed as an accessory in cases of hernia. “Busq net’s new method consists in the ingestion of aetivo serum from .the hull; and women as well as men can undergo the treatment. The effects last about three weeks, and- the method should he continually repeated.

j “My own method by ingestion of young human blood has the advantage that it is absolutely inoffensive, especially as only the plasma, or siorilised .surum, is now used, the action being not of biologic type, but 'rather chemical. ■ • Wo do ‘not'-know exactly what is the active print p c in young blood, but'it has been shown | that it has 'a' valuable' rejuvenating property. '■ “The blood acts, not as a stimulant, but 'as a real-generator, so that the normal action of all the subject s

functions is ro-estbalisliod. Tliis is evidently all to ■ tb.e 1 good. Later, others will gd'farther still, for what has (been accomplished is still very little, compared with tiie possibilities.”