Test to measure the ageing process to go on sale

A new DNA test that can give users greater insight of how long they are likely to live is to go on sale in the UK.
Producer Life Length plans to sell the home test kit over the counter at a cost of around £400.
Although it can not predict a how long a person will live, it can provide an insight into how quickly a person is ageing.
It does this by measuring telomeres, structures on the end of chromosomes, which scientists believe are an important indicator of the speed at which a person is ageing.
Several studies have indicated that that those with shorter-than-normal telomeres are likely to die younger than those with longer telomeres.
Inventor of the test Maria Blasco of the Spanish National Cancer Research Centre in Madrid, said: “We know that people who are born with shorter telomeres than normal also have a shorter lifespan.
“But we don’t know whether longer telomeres are going to give you a longer lifespan. That’s not really known in humans.”