Originally published November 29 2005
Study says early retirement is an unhealthy choice
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
The British Medical Journal has published a study that claims retiring at 55 increases a person's death risks.
A study published today indicates men and women who retire early at age 55 have a significantly increased risk of death as compared with those who retire at 65.
In this research, death was almost twice as likely in the first 10 years after retirement at age 55 compared with those who continued working.
The study, published online by BMJ, was adjusted to take into consideration factors such as sex and socioeconomic status.
Although some workers in the study retired at 55, because of failing health, "these results clearly show that early retirement is not associated with increased survival," conclude the authors.
On the contrary, mortality improved with increasing age at retirement for people from both high and low socioeconomic groups.
The authors said there has been a widespread perception that early retirement is associated with longer life expectancy and later retirement is associated with early death.
But no consensus has been reached on the effect of early retirement on survival.
Retiring early at 55 or 60 was not associated with better survival than retiring at 65 in this study of past employees of the petrochemical industry.
The study population consisted of all past employees of Shell Oil in the United States who retired at 55, 60, or 65, and employees who were actively working at 55 or 60, during a period of 31 years between 1 January 1973 and 31 December 2003.
In contrast to those who retired at 55, employees who retired at 60 had similar survival to those who retired at 65.
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