The first important finding was formulated by Greenwood and Irwin in the following way: “…the increase of mortality rate with age advances at a slackening rate, that nearly all, perhaps all, methods of graduation of the type of Gompertz’s formula over-state senile mortality” (Greenwood and Irwin, 1939, p. 14). This observation was confirmed later by many authors (see review in Gavrilov and Gavrilova, 1991), and it is known as the “late-life mortality deceleration.”
considered to be so important that they were featured at the front page of academic
journal “Human Biology,” where their study was published. This study, accomplished by
the famous British statistician and epidemiologist, Major Greenwood, may be interesting
to discuss here because it correctly describes the mortality pattern at advanced ages for
humans.
surviving to extreme ages with subsequent efforts of strict age validation. This approach
helps researchers to resolve the third of the above-mentioned problems but does not
resolve the first two problems because of inevitable data heterogeneity when data for
people belonging to different birth cohorts and countries are pooled together.
surviving to extreme ages with subsequent efforts of strict age validation. This approach
helps researchers to resolve the third of the above-mentioned problems but does not
resolve the first two problems because of inevitable data heterogeneity when data for
people belonging to different birth cohorts and countries are pooled together.