07 Mar 2004 09:16:15 GMT
Eat meat and live longer, says Chinese centenarian

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BEIJING, March 7 (Reuters) - Meat meals are the secret of Chinese centenarian Bi Deben, a retired dustman with 103 years behind him, news agency Xinhua said on Sunday.

"The Beijing centenarian says if he has no meat for just a day, he feels 'uneasy'," the official news agency said.

The idea may appeal to fans of low-carb diets gaining popularity in the United States, but China has only one-twelfth of the world's centenarians, despite being home to about one-fifth of its population.

Or maybe the key to longevity is more mundane. A study of about one-fifth of Beijing's 257 centenarians showed many ate and drank in moderation, took regular exercise, were cheerful and had "harmonious" family lives, Xinhua said.

It quoted Wu Cangping, chairman of the China Senior Citizens Society, as saying the country had just 17,000 of the global total of 210,000 centenarians.

Xinhua did not explain the low ratio of centenarians, but the vast majority of China's people live in the countryside, where poverty is widespread and health care is rudimentary.

About 10 percent of the population of 1.3 billion was over the age of 60, Wu said.

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