should now this is bbc news. the headlines... the evacuation of foreign nationals from sudan gets under way, as fighting in the capital, khartoum, continues for a second week. this was an evacuation ship arriving injeddah. kenyan police say they've exhumed 21 bodies following an investigation into a religious group, whose followers were allegedly urged to fast themselves to death. a deadly restaurant fire in madrid. two people have died and at least 12 others are injured. the australian entertainer, barry humphries, dies at the age of 89. he was best known for performances of his alter egos dame edna everage, and sir les patterson.

wrexham secured a fairy tale return to the english football league after a 15—year absence — with their hollywood owners. you are watching bbc news — now it's time for forever young? from the moment we arrive on this planet, we're all heading in the same direction. i could come up with a date predicting when you would die. well, thanks, but maybe the way that the years play out isn't inevitable. so, how about the idea of being able to increase our health spans, live the better years of our lives for longer, feel like we're a0 at 60? there's 15 to 17 years of healthy life that is up for grabs for all of us.

we head to california to meet the scientists and founders who want to make it a reality. ageing, by itself, is the largest risk factor for every single disease, this chronic disease of ageing. so, by targeting it, you target all disease together. but how do we separate science from snake oil? the longevity industry is worth billions, with hopes of delaying disease, extending our sprightly years, and maybe even throwing in a few extra. i let a system of science and data run my body. it does a betterjob taking care of me than i can. maybe even our furry friends can be with us for longer. pff! he sneezed in my face! and the things some people will do to stay young. really nicejob. push it out, push it out. you got this.

do you consider yourself a guinea pig? no, i don't. i consider myself to be an explorer on the frontiers, trying to find out what's possible. tech entrepreneur bryanjohnson is spending millions trying to turn back time on his body. i refer to myself as a professional rejuvenation athlete. it's a new sport i want to create. i'm not a biohacker. i'm not a health enthusiast. i am a professional rejuvenation athlete. i love it. working with a team of 30 scientists, his daily life is dictated by an extreme regime of fitness, diet, tablets, tracking and treatments. i am chronologically 45 years old. biologically, i'm a few hundred ages. my left ear is 64. my fitness tests that say i'm 18.

my heart is 37, my diaphragm strength is 18. and i playfully say i'm trying to become like an 18—year—old. my son is 17 and so i always tease him and say, "when i grow younger, i want to be like you." where's he taking me? wow! where to start in here? what's this? this is high—frequency electromagnetic stimulation. we got this machine because we were trying to solve a problem. every night, i was getting up one time per night to go to the bathroom, and when i do so, that's actually normal. but when i did so, it produced less quality sleep. so i wanted to see if i could get up zero times. so we got this machine to trial, could we strengthen my pelvic floor and my bladder so that i wouldn't get up at night go to the bathroom? if you want to try it out, if you want to just sit down. 0k. is it going to vibrate or something? it's actually... a lot of women use this after having babies...

..to rebuild the strength of their pelvic floor. a lot of women will do kegel exercises. yeah. this is basically a kegel, just through stimulation. right. so, i'm going to turn it on. 0k. and the feeling is going to be a little foreign and it might be shocking initially. 0k. machine whirs and crackles. 0h! it's like pins and needles. it's sort of tickling, but tickling in a quite hard, aggressive way. how long do you need to do it for? the session is 30 minutes. but actually, it's been successful. is this one of those devices that measures the age of your skin? that's right. how's yours doing? we've made about 22 years of progress in reversing the age of my skin. it takes all these images of your face and you get about ten reports, on pore size, uv spots — reds, browns. your skin is amazing. but is this just from your regime or is there other help? other help, too. we have some lasers over there, which i'll show you. there's no injections? that'sjust from everything in here? that's right.

and what do we have next? so, this is something that also tells you the health of your cardiovascular system through your age. it looks at advanced glycenated products in your skin. so, if you want to try it, you could put your arm on it and it will tell you your age. ideal score would be around two. right. so i'm only a little bit too old for my age. it could be worse! what's next? ok, this is an ultrasound machine. it's medical grade. so, this is what you'd see in a hospital. a lot of people... are you having a baby? ha, ha! who knows, with what you're getting up to already? what are you actually using it for? so, we look at the brain, the lungs, the heart, the pancreas, the prostate, tendons, ligaments — everything. it's really a useful technology to have in the clinic to do it on a routine basis. how do you feel, just before you do any of this tracking? do you get a bit nervous? hopeful? do you have expectations? it is a game. some of my most happiest days are when we do these full measurement days. that's a lot better. i know! what's your motivation? are you doing this for

yourself or for humanity? when i was 21 years old, i decided that i wanted to spend my life doing something meaningfulfor the world and i didn't know what to do. so i said, "i'm going to make a whole bunch of money "being an entrepreneur by the age of 30, then i'll decide what to do." and so for the past... since i sold my company, braintree venmo, i made $300 million. and this question was, what could i do that would matter in the year 2500? and right now, it could be ageing. if we slowed the speed of ageing and even reversed it, it would change what it means to be human. do you think you're risking your health here? in all the things you're doing to protect it, do you think there's also some real risk? certainly there's always risks. but there's potentially an argument that we are being more safe than anyone else because we have the rigour of measurement. whilst bryan's signed his life away to experimentation, i visit the buck, the world's first

institute for ageing research. these scientists are working on drugs that they hope could delay age—related disease. would you say there's been huge scientific advancement in this field recently, or is there just a sudden trend for investment and interest in it? the science has matured, in terms of, you know, we've been doing this for close to 30 years, understanding the basic mechanism of ageing, number one. number two is, societal needs are there. you have a rapidly ageing population with an increasing burden of chronic diseases. this place is huge. this is one of about 20 labs. three, two, one — squeeze. it's notjust drugs and supplements being put through their paces here, though. it's also exercise.

but one really important discovery in mice here was the ability to reduce what are called senescent cells. these zombie cells play a useful role throughout our lifetimes. but as we age, we acquire many more. and as they also lead to inflammation, that increased number ends up providing a hotbed for cancer and all sorts of disease. so, biotech companies are trying to create drugs that will reduce that cellular senescence.

i'm adding my reagent to the eye tissue, so that i can understand which types of cells are senescent. unity�*s using this science and it's now achieved small early—stage clinical trials for eye injections to treat macular degeneration — that's failing eyesight that glasses can't fix. i'm able to stain the senescent cells purple so that i can visualise spatially within the eye where senescent cells reside. a lot of different, erm, items. once you get rid of one of these cells, it's gone. this would be a small number of treatments over a limited amount of time. one of the things we've started to see is that because the fda won't approve drugsjust foranti—aging, companies are looking for a specific problem to treat. alzheimer's disease is an important one. cardiovascular diseases, kidney diseases, liver diseases. all of these are diseases that are...more prevalent as we get older and to the extent

that they have a basis of cellular senescence, these agents we're working on could have applicability in other disease areas. so, here, we're actually testing different drug candidates on our animal models. and so we test in a diseased animal model. does our drug actually inhibit the neovascularisation from forming or actually get rid of it once it's already formed? a lot of mouse trials haven't translated well into humans. we believe that it translates relatively well, compared to maybe, like, a tumour of cells and a tumour in a human. quite creepy when you know what it is. yeah! i think it's quite cool. but maybe we're missing something.

lifestyle is responsible for about 93% of your longevity. only about 7% on your genetics. so, you can't blame your parents. a lot of exercise, some fasting, a lot of the good sleep, a lot of social connection, very little alcohol. try to spend at least 1a hours of your 24—hour day without ingesting any calories. this has profound effect on your metabolism, on many of the pathways. so based on the data, i would predict that most people could live to 95 in good health, if they did all of the things that we know will promote your healthy lifespan. but if they work, why do we need to be trying to deal with this bigger picture of cellular senescence? senescence is still going to happen. hopefully, if you exercise, it's going to be delayed by ten, 15, 20 years. i don't mean to be saying that lifestyle interventions is all that needs to be done. there's, there's a need

for science for the future. what's that thing that people do where they try and they sit on the floor and then they try and get up without using their hands? whatever eric's been doing seems to be working. this is meant to be some sort of sign of youth, isn't it... yes. ..if you can stand up by not using your hands and just... how can anyone do that? pushing your feet down? how's it possible? how do you do that? i don't know. i think it means that you're under 20 or something! exactly. erm. i can't do it. take my hand. thank you! snoring. 0ur furry friends could get their paws on a life—extending pill first, though. # i love my dog to bits...# you'll notice there are no great danes here. there are no large dogs here,

and it's because they can sometimes have a lifespan of six, seven, eight, nine years. you know, almost half that of what a little guy like this could be expected to have. and our hypothesis is that the short lifespan of big dogs is a disease. we are a senior dog rescue so when we are a senior dog rescue so when we take in dogs like a great dane for instance, at five years old they are already startin- for instance, at five years old they are already startin- to for instance, at five years old they are already startin- to a-e for instance, at five years old they are already startin- to a-e so for instance, at five years old they are already startin- to a-e so much. are already starting to age so much. it would be a miracle cure if we could have some of our big dogs live longer, and live as long as our small dogs. so where are you at now with the trials? so we're kicking off our big pivotal study. so we're trying to understand, you know, does our drug extend lifespan and quality of life? it's a preventative drug inhibiting the protein that we believe drives big dogs to age fast. and if everything goes to plan, we'll hopefully have a drug on market in 2025.

if successful, loyal�*s drug could hasten a solution for humans, too. has there been any sort of scientific breakthrough that has made possible what you are trying to do? 50 made possible what you are trying to do? ., , .,, made possible what you are trying to do? ., , .,�* made possible what you are trying to do? ., , ., , made possible what you are trying to do? ., , .,�* .,, , do? so what people don't realise is there have been _ do? so what people don't realise is there have been hundreds- do? so what people don't realise is there have been hundreds of- do? so what people don't realise is there have been hundreds of drugs| there have been hundreds of drugs that have shown life span expansion in mice. the issue is that you can't develop a drug for people today for pure logistical standpoint. if i gave you an antiaging drug it would be decades before i know your eventual life span. be decades before i know your eventual life span. so dogs eat similar diets to us, they live in the same environment, and they also develop the same age—related diseases we do at approximately the same time in their lifespan. so if a drug works in a dog... it's not one—to—one to work in a human, but it's much more likely, versus we do a lot of research in mice and that doesn't translate at all. back to humans. and if we want to reduce the age that our body seems rather than is,

well, we need to find a way to measure it. i was really put through my paces with this test, assessing my baseline, then pushing me to my physical limit. was this really necessary? really nice job. push it out. you got this. good job. thank you. what a relief to take that off. i've recovered. so how fit am i? you did a really nice job. nice test. at least i discovered at the end that i've a fitness age of 36 — that's seven years lower than my years. but there is an easier way. a few drops of blood, and this scientist's invention, known as the epigenetic clock, can assess my biological age and possibly the date of my demise.

this grimage, which is our best mortality risk predictor. and, unfortunately, you're a little bit older than you should be. it says 49 years. that's unfortunate. you know, it's very important to have a sense of humour when one looks at these reports. what, about death? i could come up with a date almost predicting when you would die, but... when do you think it's going to occur, according to this? we don't give people this. what i can... you know? you know the answer to that question? i have a way to calculate it, yeah. can you tell me? no. he laughs i won't. and the reason is things change. you know, people develop healthy habits or bad habits, you know, bad luck. so it's actually not very informative for you. you can't even tell me what the likelihood of which illness it is. no, i can't. you don't know the difference between any illness — it is just that my body is ageing that bit faster.

yes. i don't mean to keep going back to this, but...a little bit disappointed. the question is really, why? i want to tell you right away, we have a lot of good news for you if you hang in there. 0k. i wanted to start with a bad note. that's good. right. 0k. then look at that — your phenoage is suddenly 36.5, seven years younger than expected. right. so my biological age is 36, my chronological age is 43, and my disease risk is a lot higher than it should be. hmm. i won't worry too much, though. it's very early days for these tests. how about this one? in fact, i'm keeping my spirits up, and i'm off to a longevity meet—up. so are these brainy scientists living the longevity lifestyle? well, there are still unopened bottles of wine, so probably. here tonight we had

a longevity—friendly mix of food, with the seaweed and the fish. other parts of the industry haven't been quite so wholesome, though. for decades, this has been... there's been a lot of snake oil, a lot of miracle pills, the god pill, all of this stuff. and many have been desperate to believe — just ask this leading silicon valley doctor. i don't know why people want to gamble with their health. i understand gambling with your money. so if it's safe and it's not effective, like a vitamin, some vitamins, you know, then you're gambling with your money. but if it's... if it's not proven safe and it's not proven effective, you're gambling with your health. and then there's people spending a lot of time doing these things, and they're not living their life — they're living a version of their life to give themselves a future life. but what happens if that future life never materialises? the repurposing of current drugs may

actually hold some promise for preventing age—related disease, and some don't even want to wait for the clinical trials. especially in silicon valley amongst techies, i mean, it's...it�*s actually hard to find somebody who isn't taking metformin, which is this diabetic drug that, you know... and these people aren't diabetics and they're typically quite healthy, but they've seen some of the studies, and even though it hasn't been approved as an anti—aging drug, they are taking it. and same with rapamycin. so you have a lot of people who are going off book, who are going doctor shopping, looking for those doctors that will give them the pills that might be for something else, but have shown, you know, an effect in extending life, at least in animals. i get asked by young men in their 40s, "should i take metformin?"j and my first question is, l "are you ready to lose half of your testosterone? " there are no medicines without side—effects. . good news is, with all this... new blood tests, there's new breath

tests, there's urine tests, there's wearables, there's apps. there's so many things to track things, so if you really want to... like, if you're overweight and you have high blood pressure and you love your wine and you love your life, but you want a pill to make you live long. guess what? can't stop the wind with your hands. and it's probably getting close to this lot�*s bedtime — they really value sleep. i want to wake up naturally because your cortisol levels, which is your stress hormone, go down as you sleep and right when you wake up, they spike. soi so i lack of good sleep can disrupt them, and interns lead to unnecessary inflammation and a high of disease. unnecessary inflammation and a high of disease. it's like inflammageing. so you want to do everything you can to decrease the inflammation in your body and, like, the pills and the supplements and the cryo and the hyperbarics and all this stuff, like, they tout that it does that. show me the measurements outside of people saying, "i feel better" —

cos, by the way, placebo? people feel better. yeah. and i'm not saying that that's placebo, cos i think there's a lot of interesting science in there. whether pills or procedures are proven or not, there are a whole lot of people who are really obsessed. does it sometimes just seem a bit cult—y, some of this stuff? he laughs i think it can. very cult—y. and i try to protect my people against that cult—y. we try not to let it become that way. there's one issue that none of this can resolve, though. in the united states, the single biggest determinant of your life expectancy is your postcode — where you live. and so that is a problem that cannot be engineered. 0nce drugs are developed, is that not going to further enhance the inequality? because who's going to get access to the drugs, and when? the model, the way it works, i is that drugs become available

and if they actually demonstrate it as being valid, they're reimbursed by insurance companies. and we expect the same thing to happen with all drugs - that we will develop together. so where does this leave us? there's exercise, but... exercise is hard. magic pills are easy. maybe one pill gets us an extra six months. another one gets us a year, and you start to piece these together, and all of a sudden, we're living to age 85, age 90, 95, healthily. will the drugs come? there are a tonne of companies who are trying to capitalise on this enthusiasm, raising a lot of money. but then you get to the very hard yards of actually science, bench science — putting something in a human body and actually having it work. and there are bigger questions over how we may need to work longer, the unexpected diseases that will emerge at these older ages, and our planet is already pretty busy.

first thing to consider- is these changes that we're talking about are not - going to happen tomorrow. they're going to be happening slowly, the same way we've . |doubled our lifespan over the last| 150 years, and we slowly adapted. as for bryan... what has the reaction been from doctors and scientists to what you're doing? cos i guess it's probably been kind of mixed. yeah, the reaction has been very mixed. i would say there's quite a few people who are excited that this is happening and it's a good blueprint for them. there's also been a colossal amount of hate, which i love. i love every bit of it. i think bryan is a... is a true pioneer. is there not a bit of a risk in what he's doing to himself? there's a concern. i mean, we will see what happens to him in the long term. - so far, his numbers look good. he claims to be extremely happy. i think it's an interesting. experiment for us to watch. mmm! delicious.

the reality is that we know a lot about the science of ageing. squeeze, squeeze. but the big scientific breakthroughs just aren't there yet. so i guess i come away from this feeling more than ever that it's so important to live your healthiest life, just maybe not quite to the extent of bryanjohnson. lucky us, we exist. let's play the most fun games we can for as long as we can. hello. in the last week, many of us have had a taste of spring from the weather temperatures in the mid—teens, even the low 20s

across western scotland. in the next few days though, spring taking something of a back—seat as colder arctic air returns to the uk. through sunday, low pressure drifting eastwards across the uk. some outbreaks of rain, some cloud. but later on in the day, on the rear of that area of low pressure, we pick up gale force winds across northern scotland, northerly winds, arctic air being ushered in that sinks all the way south across the uk through the early part of the new week. as we move into the small hours of sunday, some cloud drifting across the uk, some further rain for scotland, for northern ireland and some heavier, more persistent, rain working its way in to the south coast as the night comes to a close. but with a lot of cloud around and the breeze, it will be a mild enough night. through sunday daytime, some quite persistent rain setting in across the south east of england and east anglia. showers elsewhere across england and wales. a brighter day for northern ireland in comparison to saturday. cloudy with some outbreaks of rain across the north east of scotland.

and you can already see the temperatures coming down here. but the most dramatic effects will be felt through the earliest part of the new week with those particularly strong winds on into monday. and then the winds ease a little bit perhaps for tuesday and wednesday, but the colder air sits right the way across the uk. on monday, showers pushing down into scotland, northern england falling snow to low levels i think across parts of scotland. a hill feature i think for northern england. further south, it's rain but it will feel chillier for all. these are the temperatures that you'd read on a thermometer, so you can already see they're down on the figures from last week. but if we factor in the wind for somewhere like aberdeen, the daytime high, when you step outside, will feel closer to around the two degree mark. the wind easing, i think, a little for tuesday and wednesday, but with easing winds monday night into tuesday, clear skies and cold air, look out for a pretty widespread frost developing. gardeners with tender plants out, definitely something to watch out for.

and then looking further ahead into the week, tuesday and wednesday, quite a lot of fine weather around. but on the chillier side, more unsettled to end the week. but then it looks like we'll see some milder air returning once again.

live from london. this is bbc news. the evacuation of foreign nationals from sudan gets under way, as fighting in the capital, khartoum, continues for a second week. this was an evacuation ship arriving injeddah. wrexham secure a fairy tale return to the english football league, watched on by their hollywood owners. the australian comedian barry humphries dies at the age of 89. he was best known for performances of his alter egos dame edna everage and sir les patterson. the australian prime minister anthony albanese pays tribute, describing barry humphries as �*one—of—a—kind' and �*gifted'. a deadly restaurant fire in madrid. two people have died and at least 12 others are injured.