1. Belgium
A large press conference took place, were three experts spoke to journalists (representatives of the French-speaking press):
- Laurent Alexandre, physician, creator of the medical website Doctissimo, author of the book “La mort de la mort. Comment la technomédecine va bouleverser l’humanité” (The death of death. Technomedicine and how it will change humanity).
- Didier Coeurnelle, co-chair of Heales (http://www.heales.org), author of the book “Et si on arrêtait de vieillir ! Réalité, enjeux et perspectives d’une vie en bonne santé beaucoup plus longue” (“What if we stopped aging: Reality, challenges and prospects for much longer and healthier life).
- Miroslav Radman, cellular biologist, member of the French Academy of Sciences, author of the book “Au-delà de nos limites biologiques” (Beyond our biological limitations).
The amount of press and exposure to longevity from this event was great!
At least 10 journalists were present from Belga, the RTBF, RTL, La Libre Belgique, Le Vif l’Express and other smaller media.
Some media reports online: Levif, RTL, Lesoir
Pictures of the press conference.
Slightly earlier, an pro-longevity public relations action was conducted by the European Healthy Life Extension Society – Heales – at the Night of Researchers gathering on September 27 inBrussels.
Thanks Martine Verhaeghe de Naeyer for this great work, especially the contacts with the journalists. Thx Guy Weets for filming. Thanks to Frederik Cheeseman for the pictures. Thanks Alexander Tietz and Victor Bjork for being there ready to help
Thanks to all who made this possible!
2. Netherlands
A small circle meeting was organized by Amanda Stoel in Bussum, Netherlands.
The meeting included a discussion about how realistic longevity was, about google now taking on anti-ageing and about specific holistic ways to promote health and longevity.
http://wellnesscoachamanda.tumblr.com/
https://www.facebook.com/groups/Longevity.Party.Netherlands/
3. Ireland
Martin O’Dea and Brian Collins report:
On International Longevity Day Eve, the Irish group ‘Combat Degenerative Ageing’ held its inaugural meeting in Dublin.
There were 6 attendees, though 3 others, to whom we must apologise profusely, turned up only to miss us due to our organisational teething issues!! Sorry guys!
The meeting was very engaging and a presentation was visited through the event which ran from a supposed one hour and a half to much longer. The level of interest evident in the issues of longevity research and advocacy again indicative of what so many know – that when openly and honestly discussed this is just the most interesting field for interest and involvement for people with all different backgrounds, and is ultimately about us all. We look forward to holding monthly meetings and developing the organisation in other ways and in conjunction with the ever growing number of similar efforts around the world.
4. Australia
A meeting for Longevity Day was organized by Adam Ford in Melbourne, Australia.
As the original announcement eloquently put it:
“Lets celebrate the impetus for research and development into mitigating the harmful effects of aging, increasing the likelihood of a world free of age-related disease! Now you know you should be coming for a fascinating discussion on recent developments in R&D into longevity/rejuvenation research. Can you dig it?”
Adam Ford reports:
“We had about 20 people turn up. … There were a lot of great discussions.”
Also in honor of the International Longevity Day and the almost concurrent Google’s Anti-Aging initiative (announced on September 18 and appearing on the cover ofTime magazine on September 30), interviews were conducted by Adam Ford with stalwarts of the worldwide longevity movement:
Ben Goertzel, Aubrey de Grey, Christine Peterson, Karl Hale, James Hughes, Anders Sandberg:
See also the group https://www.facebook.com/groups/LongevityAllianceAustralia/
5. Israel
On October 1, the International Day of Older Persons/ International Longevity Day, the conference took place in Tel Aviv, at the Hemda Science Education Center, titled “From Biology of Aging to Longevity and Quality of Life”.
The conference was a success! Over 70 researchers and research students participated, from all the universities in Israel, with 16 presentations by some of the top researchers. Over 30 submissions were made for the excellence prize for the research of biology of aging, longevity and quality of life, and 8 prizes were awarded to 8 applicants from 8 different laboratories!
Many thanks to Dr. Eitan Krein, director of the Science program at Hemda Science Education Center in Tel Aviv and Yanki Margalit, the social entrepreneur and Chairman of SpaceIL Foundation – for making this event possible!
Many thanks to the judges of the excellence prize: Prof. Vera Gorbunova (US), Prof. Zipora Yablonka-Reuveni (US), and Prof Gil Atzmon (US).
Here is the conference program, Video-recordings of the conference presentations and some pictures.
In addition, over 150 people attended the session for the general public that was held after the conference.
Special thanks to Dr. Yaakov Ben Shaul for helping to spread the word about the conference and the subject of longevity research in the Israeli mass media on that day, including several tv, radio and newspapers interviews!
Many thanks to all the wonderful people who attended, contributed proposals and presentations, helped and supported! Hopefully, many more activities in support of longevity research will follow – raising public awareness and lobbying for the field of the biology of aging and longevity research and its importance for the public health in Israel and everywhere!
6. India
6. IndiaTwo seminars on longevity research were organized in India by members of India Future Society http://indiafuturesociety.org/
One was organized by Siddartha S Verma in Bangalore.
As Siddartha reports:
The event started with 6 to 7 people in Bangalore. In the first session, a video talk on “Google vs. Death- Google’s and other Anti-Aging Initiatives” by Ben Goertzel was shown to the audience.
Then, a video talk on “Google Vs. Death: an Anti-Aging initiative- Progress in regenerative medicine” by Aubrey de Grey was shown.
A half an hour break was provided to the audience for lunch, in which Italian Pizzas were offered for free to them.
Following that, there was a talk on “Longevity Day” for 30 minutes (by Siddartha).
Audience were then engaged in a Game Round for 45 minutes, in which a list of Longevity related questions were asked to them. An interesting set of answer was obtained. Each of these rounds were followed by a Question and Answer session.
Penultimate session was a 30 minutes TED talk by Aubrey de Grey on- “Anti-aging research and Biology”.
Last session was a closing and feedback session for all the people.
Some pictures from the meeting.
Another longevity day event was organized in Uttar Pradesh by Avinash Kumar Singh of the India Future Society
As Avinash reports:
The Longevity Day event/open discussion was conducted at Harcourt Butler Technological Institute Kanpur on 1st October, 2013. The target audience of this event were Professors and Researchers. The Agenda of the discussion was:
1. What is Longevity ? 2. Why is it needed ? 3. What are the possible ways of Longevity ?
The main speaker of the event was Mr Rahul Singh, who is a researcher in the Vedic Sciences. He explained about possible longevity ways, trends and reasons behind the death. In the open discussion most of the people agreed and concluded that Digital Immortality is the only possible way. People also believe that Indian Vedic Science already has several ways to achieve longevity. One of the most common ways is the Kundalini Energy Control or in other words advanced level of Yoga to achieve Longevity.
At the end of Open Discussion, We’ve shown a movie “Transhuman” of about 30 min focused on Digital Immortality.
Some pictures from the meeting.
7. Pakistan
Two meetings for longevity day were organized in Pakistan by members of Longevity Pakistan group.
One was organized at the Department of Zoology, University of Peshawar, Pakistan, by Wisal Khan. As Wisal reports, about 70 people participated including advanced students (MSC, MPhil, and PhD) and about 10 Faculty members.
A presentation was shown about the basic concepts of Transhumanism and Life extension
An additional event was organized by Prof. Muhammad Aslamkhan at the University of Health Sciences, Lahore, Pakistan, where about 30 people participated. The paper was read by Prof. Aslamkhan entitled “Longevity: Add Years to Your Life – But How?”
8. Russia
Longevity Day in Moscow.
Elena Milova reports:
The Russian Transhumanist Movement – RTM (http://transhuman.ru/) and the Culture Center “NEGA” jointly conducted the celebration of the International Longevity Day on October 5, 2013, aligning with the International Day of Older Persons.
The speakers were the futurologist Danila Medvedev and gerontologist Igor Artyuhov. They convincingly told the audience about the latest achievements of medicine allowing us to hope for a radical extension of longevity, already in the next 20-30 years. There was an encouraging wave of questions and a short discussion dedicated to problems of implementing the already existing technologies. Among other topics, there was discussed the necessity to recognize aging as a disease. Such a recognition should introduce into practice the prevention of degenerative aging, which, among other benefits, would simplify the procedures for registration and massive application of geroprotective substances.
The complete video-recording of the meeting
And photographs, including photographs from the NEGA website.
During the meeting, there were shown video greetings from supporters of life extension from other countries, representatives of the International Longevity Alliance (ILA): Ilia Stambler, the longevity scientist and activist from Israel (in Russianand English) and a team of longevity scientists and activists from Ukraine: Anton Kulaga, Dmitry Shytikov, and others (in Russian and English).
Information and advice regarding the prevention of the aging process by the already known methods were presented by representatives of the Russian Transhumanist movement. These were accepted with gratitude and interest. Later, in the lobby, interested persons could buy the book by Aubrey de Grey – “Ending Aging” in Russian and the book by Mikhail Batin “Cures against Aging”. After the event, the participants had hot beverages and simple refreshments, and networked with speakers and activists of the Russian Transhumanist Movement in an informal atmosphere.
Three days after this event, on October 9, 2013, the Culture Center NEGA hosted the meeting of the RTM speaker Elena Milova and the young scientist Yury Matveev with the club of WWII veterans – “My Dear Friend”. The supporters of radical life extension told the veterans about the activity of the RTM in the field of science popularization, and the key task – the delay and reversal of aging thanks to advances of the Scientific and Technological Progress. Despite the advanced age of the majority of the meeting participants, they actively participated in the discussion, asked questions, commented on the situation with healthcare and expressed ideas on what they can do to help science.
In addition, the Longevity Day initiative was supported by the Russian Science for Life Extension Foundation (http://www.scienceagainstaging.org/) and the Fedorov’s movement (http://nffedorov.ru/)
9. Ukraine
In Kiev, Ukraine, the International Longevity Day was celebrated at the Institute o Gerontology of the Ukrainian Academy of Sciences (Kiev, Vyshgorodsky St. 67), in the main conference hall.
The presentations included – Foreword by the organizing committee;
a video-greeting to the conference participants from several countries:
Lectures were presented by Anton Kulaga (International Longevity Alliance) on International activism for life prolongation, Dmitry Shytikov (Laboratory of immunology and pathophysiology of the Kiev Gerontology Institute) – Crowdfunding as a method of financing lifespan extension experiments – practical experience, Alexander Kolyada (Laboratory of Epigenetics of the Kiev Gerontology Institute) – genetics and epigenetics of aging, and Volodymir Semenyuk – The role of citizen science in the combat of aging.
At the time of the Longevity Day, a pioneering initiative was being conducted by the Ukrainian longevity activists and scientists, in cooperation with international activists – the crowdfunding effort to fund lifespan extension experiments in mice:
http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/i-am-a-l
ittle-mouse-and-i-want-to-live-longer
The crowd-funding campaign was a success! As the organizers, Anton Kulaga, Edouard Debonneuil, Irina Pishel, Dmitry Shytikov, and Daniel Wuttke report:
Little mouse crowdfunding campaign – mission accomplished! So now it is time for hard work on experiments and producing valuable results.
Thank you so much for making this possible!
http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/i-am-a-littl
e-mouse-and-i-want-to-live-longer?c=activity
10. France
A Longevity Day meeting was organized in Sceaux, close to Paris, France, by Edouard Debonneuil, head of the Longévité & Santé (Longevity and Health) Association. The meeting took place on Saturday afternoon, October 5th. This interactive conference included presentations by prominent researchers of the biology of aging, such as Fathi Moussa, who presented on his work on “Fullerens and Longevity”.
- A panel of suggestions by the audience on how to add more years of healthy life was built, ranging from promoting better lifestyles and preventing falls to fostering research on aging and testing long term effects of medicines, chemicals and interventions. Also, “Trust Science” was the consensual message to decision-makers willing to truly increase healthy life.
11. Germany
On October 1, a discussion group about Longevity Research was organized at the University of Bremen, Germany, by Hashem Al-ghaili.
In addition Hashem published a promotional appeal about the Longevity Day via his extensive social network (over 25,000 followers).
Hoping for more field activity and online presence for longevity in Germany!
The same can be said for Austria, where efforts to organize meetings and create website presence have been made in Vienna.
12. The UK.
Several events took place in the UK in conjunction with the Longevity Day.
On September 29, the eve of the Longevity Day, David Wood, head of London Futurists, organized a public broadcast on
The exploration started with a meetup, held as a Google “Hangout On Air” and broadcast live on YouTube, in which four panellists shared news and views on:
• Projects they (or their organisations) have recently completed
• Projects they are working on and/or planning to do next
• Any issues that are blocking them from doing more.
The panellists also discussed ways in which a wider community of people can usefully become involved in activities to accelerate radical healthy longevity.
Here is the complete video-recording
Complete project description.
An additional meeting was held at Queen’s Larder, in London, by members of theZero State group, on September 28:
According to the organizer, Amon Kalkin:
One of the most energetic areas associated with Futurism, Transhumanism, & Singularitarianism is that of longevity research and advocacy. While Zero State has not run any kind of longevity research or advocacy project up until this point, we intend to set up a group to explore the possibility of supporting longevity activism led by other organizations, with particular emphasis upon those which are affiliated with the broader Wave movement for positive social change through technology (of which ZS is a part).
In short, Zero State is evolving to become part of something larger and even more exciting, and that process is marked by a new engagement with longevity activism. We’re very excited about this, and hope to become a significant part of the movement to defeat ageing over the next few years, particularly through vigorous support of other organizations.
Please read the full report about this meeting here: http://wavism.wordpress.com/2013/10/21/wav
e-longevity-advocacy-sep-28th-meeting-summary/
Or here: http://www.longevityday.org/united-kingdom.html
In addition, the Longevity Day was endorsed by several UK life-extensionist organizations, such as:
Longevity Intelligence Communications (LIC), recently started by Stuart Calimport, promoting collective actions and public affairs for longevity
http://lonintelcomms.tumblr.com/
Longevity Intelligence Communications also promoted a petition in support of the Longevity Day
The leader of the British Longevity Society, Marios Kyriazis, also expressed his support. A major action of the society is planned for October 29, when the society will organize a meeting with the Minister for Care and Support Mr Norman Lamb, at the House of Commons.
Also, support for the Longevity Day was expressed by several prominent members of the Methuselah Foundation and SENS research foundation, also during the recent SENS6 conference, earlier in September in Cambridge
http://www.sens.org/outreach/conferences/sens6.
Most prominently by Aubrey de Grey.
13. The US
On October 1, there was a special meeting titled “Hacking Health: Dr Sean Mooney on how computer geeks are fixing our biology” at Health Extension Salon, in San Francisco, California.
As well said by the organizer, Joe Betts Lacroix:
“Most biologists are now underqualified to interpret massive genetic data, so we need to bring in the tech community to save our lives. Dr. Sean Mooney, the director of the Bioinformatics Department at the Buck Institute on Aging, described how people with computer skills are making the next wave of discoveries relating to our biology, and in particular, how we can learn to prevent age-related diseases by mining the data in our genomes. Soon, that data will multiply by orders of magnitude, as DNA sequencing goes clinical.
Celebrate INTERNATIONAL LONGEVITY DAY! = Oct 1st
In addition, the Longevity Day was endorsed by many life-extensionist organizations in the US, including:
In addition, the Longevity Day was endorsed by many life-extensionist organizations in the US, including:Longecity, whose director Justin Loew also endorsed this day on TV.
http://www.longecity.org/forum/topic/64402-making-the-longevity-day-on-october-1/
Fight Aging
https://www.fightaging.org/archives/2013/10/october-1st-is-international-longevity-day.php
IEET – Institute for Ethics and Emerging Tecnnologies
http://ieet.org/index.php/IEET/print/8217
Humanity Plus Magazine
Immortal Life
http://immortallife.info/articles/entry/october-1-is-longevity-day-show-your-support
Which slightly earlier held a large conference in support of Longevity research in Washington DC, on September 22.
Brighter Brains
http://brighterbrains.org/articles/entry/celebrating-international-longevity-day
And several others.
14. Egypt
A ground-breaking effort to promote Longevity Advocacy was made in Egypt, led by Ahmed Adel Ibrahim.
Some of the activities included building probably the first of its kind pro-longevity websites in Arabic, including:
Longevity Egypt
http://longevityegypt.wordpress.com/
and Egyptian Cryonics Society
http://egyptiancryonicssociety.wordpress.com/
And initiating a longevity interest group:
Longevity Egypt - الرابطة المصرية لإطالة الحياة
https://www.facebook.com/groups/LongevityEgypt/
A strong effort was made to organize a meeting in support of longevity research for Longevity Day in Cairo. Even though it was not possible to conduct such a meeting, these pioneering efforts will grow inexorably.
Additional efforts to organize groups and meetings have been made in Iraq, and Iran (Tehran specifically).
Though, in these cases too, it was not yet possible to organize meetings. Yet, there is very little doubt that pro-longevity events will take place there rather sooner than later!
To encourage such activities and information outreach in the Middle-Eastern languages (Arabic, Persian, Hebrew, Turkish, Kurdish, Urdu, and others), a new site is currently under construction:
Longevity Middle East
https://www.facebook.com/groups/LongevityMiddleEast/
Contributions are welcome!
15. Spain
For the longevity day, a meeting took place in Seville, Spain, of a working/initiative group of prominent Spanish and Portuguese transhumanists, including: Sergio Tarrero and Javier Ruiz (from Spain) and José Raeiro and Mafalda Dias (from Portugal) and others. More news will be soon forthcoming from Spain! Stay tuned!
Several events in support of longevity research were organized in several Latin American countries toward the International Longevity Day. These events are path-setting!
16. Venezuela
On October 1, a conference took place at Jose Antonio Paez University
San Diego, Carabobo, Venezuela
Titled “The Longevity Day: Overcoming the Biological Barriers”
According to the organizer, Abelardo Jesus Marquez of Longevity Venezuela:
There were made presentations made by Edison Alexander Duran, explaining the way to transhumanism and radical life extension thanks to the latest developments in science and technology, and by Abelardo Jesus Marquez talking about the latest developments in robotics and how these will help us improve the human.
A strong support for the Longevity Day was given by the prominent Venezuelan futurist Jose Cordeiro, who recorded an inspiring video greeting for that day that was distributed from Peru to Ukraine, and who also promoted the idea of Celebrating the Longevity Day during his travels in East Asia during this period: in North and South Korea and China.
As Abelardo Marquez reports:
The feedback after the event was really positive, many of the attendees commented to us that they had no idea of the current state on scientific developments towards longevity and that they would from now on, try to know more about it.
Please read the full report and see some pictures from the meeting here: http://www.longevityday.org/venezuela.html
17. Mexico
A meeting was being organized by a small group of Mexican longevity activists in Mexico City. Hoping for increased activity.
http://www.longevityday.org/mexico.html
http://100ciaysalud.blogspot.mx
18. Brazil
Efforts were being made to organize meetings in Brazil: in São Paulo and Santa Maria. Yet, eventually it was not possible to conduct the meetings. Nonetheless, the Longevity Day was promoted in the widely read media outlet by Andre Massaro from São Paulo. This was probably one of the premier pieces of advocacy for longevity research in Brazil! Every little bit of action and information counts!
19. Argentina
A screening of a video by Aubrey de Grey was done by a group of longevity supporters in Mar de Ajo in Buenos Aires area, organized by Sebastian Andres Presta. Hoping for more actions!
20. Colombia
Yet, the strongest activity for Longevity Day in Latin America was conducted by the Colombian Longevity Alliance, led by Adrian Correa. Also special thanks to Julio Andres Acosta for his support!
Toward the International Longevity Day, the Colombian group took on itself the creation of the logo for the International Longevity Alliance, as well as the creation of most of the promotional materials (flyers and posters).
A radio interview was conducted in honor of that day by Adrian Correa as well as several promotional recordings on youtube.
But the main achievement was the creation of the site for the promotion of different branches of longevity research in Spanish! Thanks Adrian Correa!
This site is hoped to help increase the global awareness and involvement of speakers of Spanish – the second most spoken language in the world – with almost 400 Million speakers. Yet, information about Longevity Research and Advocacy is extremely scarce in Spanish. This will be probably one of the first sites (if not the first) dedicated specifically to the topic. This is a ground-breaking development.
Hopefully, there will be more sites created to promote longevity research and advocacy in various national languages, in which information is scarce. There is little information in such languages as German, French and Italian. And it is extremely scarce for languages of Eastern Europe, Middle East, Africa and Asia! We must help to replenish this scarcity!
21. Italy.
Toward the International Longevity Day, there was an activation of the Italian groupof the International Longevity Alliance (Longevisti http://longevisti.it/)
According to the activists Massimiliano Maidano, David de Biassi, and Sergio Bossi,
A group of 6 people met in Turin, Italy, for a discussion of longevity science during the Longevity Day – Oct. 1. Apparently this is the first group of Italian longevity activists to meet in a physical setting.
As members of the Italian Longevity Alliance are scattered across Italy and even other countries, a skype meeting of the most active members was conducted on that day. The main conclusion was to encourage the creation of other “offline” local groups of activists in other cities, on the example of Turin.
In addition, the Italian group (especially Massimiliano Maidano and David de Biassi) was instrumental in developing the concept of the International Longevity Alliance logo (that was finalized toward the Longevity Day) and the development of the Longevity Art group https://www.facebook.com/groups/LongevityArt/.
Furthermore, the site of the Italian branch of the Longevity Alliance was elaborated and expanded – increasing the amount of information and outreach in Italian.
22. Serbia
A radio program about anti-aging research was organized in Belgrade by Dragan Tabakovic.
23. Romania
A study session on anti-aging and longevity research was organized in Constanta, Romania, by Alexandru Chircu.
According to Alexandru:
We’ve talked about the importance of delaying aging, about it’s ethics, then we presented a list of substances that help us stay young (mostly racetams). There was not enough interest from the participants for a study group, but we hope to have better luck next year.
See the emerging groups of Romanian longevity activists:
Longevity Constanta and Longevity Party Romania
24. Czech Republic
Toward the Longevity Day, the Czech longevity activism group was created.
According to the founder, Gunther Kletechka
“The group was created and several people joined. There was no too much activity in the group other that occasional posting. The most significant was that the group was created.”
25.Slovakia
Also the Slovak longevity activism group was created toward the Longevity Day. The group that will work in tight cooperation with the Czech and Austrian group. Thanks Nicola Gigante for your initiative! Looking forward to more activism.
26.Bulgaria
And yet another Easter European longevity activism group was established by Lilia Lens-Pechakova, originally from Bulgaria. This group is called “Closing the East-West Gap” and is dedicated to bring the level of longevity and longevity research in countries of Eastern Europe to that of Western Europe – and both to an ever higher level!
Closing the East-West Gap group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/closingtheeastwestgap/
Longevity Bulgaria Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/HLEBg/
27. Poland
On 26-27 September 2013, during 1st International Interdisciplinary Conference on CHALLENGES IN LANGUAGE and in Conjunction with the International Longevity Day, there was held a conference at Instytut Języków Obcych PWSZ w Nowym Sączu (at the General Philological Institute at Nowy Sacz, Poland).
Dr. Monika Madej-Cetnarowska organized a special session at the conference about the legacy of Nikolay Fedorov, suggesting Longevity and the Fight with Death as the common unifying task of humanity. 3 papers were presented on this subject.
Group: http://www.facebook.com/groups/LongevityPartyPoland/
28.Finland
On October 1, a meeting was held in Helsinki
According to Antti Peltonen, Ville Salmensuu, and Teo Piitulainen:
There was 3 of us. There was Ville’s report in Longevity Finland facebook group (but in Finnish). Which went pretty much like: “We were gathered by the invitation of Antti, to discuss about how longevity could work in Finland. We decided to establish a web community (compare LessWrong, Stack Overflow, Slashdot), where we could share practical and reliable information about long and healthy life, in Finnish and for Finns. Still looking for a good name for it. The whole thing would aim to healthy lives. We would meet up again after couple of weeks to check progress and discuss more. Probably in conjunction with LessWrong meeting. We have to see how it starts to progress from this onward.
See the group “Longevity Finland”
See also the emerging site of Longevity Finland
Photo from the meeting.
29. Benin
Serious effort was made to organize meetings in Benin, West Africa, that must be mentioned,
as well as in Uganda, East Africa, and in South Africa and Zimbabwe,
and in Africa Generally
https://www.facebook.com/groups/LongevityAfrica/
Let us hope – the level and scope of Longevity Activism and research in Africa will increase, as soon as possible!
30. Canada
The group of the Canadian Longevity Alliance has been established in this period, led by Franco Cortese.
As Franco Cortese reports:
The CLA will focus on representing the mission and vision of the ILA, and their policy and law-change initiatives, on the Canadian front. A shorter-term focus will be forming a network of Canadian activists, providing activists with free resources (like printable signs, petitions and informative literature to distribute to interested onlookers) to help reduce the logistical challenges facing activists and demonstration-organizers in organizing and implementing an activism demonstration, encouraging activists to become advocates on behalf of the CLA at speaking engagements and events, encouraging activists to directly participate in education and outreach initiatives, and organizing effective and actionable activist demonstrations in Canadian locales.
Please read the full report here:
http://longevityalliance.org/canadian-longevity-alliance/
Please visit the group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/LongevityCanada/
31. Georgia
On the initiative of the longevity researcher and activist, Dr. Jaba Tkemaladze, on October 1, a petition was presented to the Head of State of the Republic of Georgia, Prime Minister Bidzina Ivanishvili, requesting to include in the budget for 2014 the financing for a small group of experts under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Health and Social Insurance.
The tasks of this group would be:
1) Search for ways and implementation of methods for complete elimination of disability.
2) Search for ways and implementation of methods to produce organs from the patients own cells, rather than transplantation from the donor.
3) Search for ways and implementation of methods for increasing the age of working capacity of the people.
To realize these tasks, the petitioners requested the state to finance the work of a group of experts consisting of 3 people.
Similar legislative initiatives in support of longevity research, can and should be replicated around the world!
See the group of the Georgian longevity activists: https://www.facebook.com/groups/LongevityPartyGeorgia
And the page: https://www.facebook.com/LongevityPartyGeorgia
32. Japan
A meeting was being organized in Tokyo by John Leonard of Japan Longevity Alliance.
See the Japan Longevity Alliance Website: http://www.japanlongevityalliance.org/alive/projectsevents/
And the group: http://www.facebook.com/groups/Longevity.Japan/
Yet, generally, the participation in the Longevity Day from the emerging groups of the International Longevity Alliance in East Asia was limited. A certain disconnection is felt. Hopefully more cooperative events will be take place during the next concerted actions!
This equally relates to the emerging groups in:
China https://www.facebook.com/groups/LongevityPartyChina/
Taiwán https://www.facebook.com/groups/LongevityPartyTaiwan/
Korea https://www.facebook.com/groups/153668691441017/
Thailand https://www.facebook.com/groups/560726163937652/
Philippines https://www.facebook.com/groups/LongevityPartyPhilippines/
Indonesia https://www.facebook.com/groups/499662436778941/
and Singapore https://www.facebook.com/groups/LongevityPartySingapore/
33. Turkey
A group of international longevity activists – Daria Khaltourina, Didier Cournelle and Ilia Stambler – gathered in Istanbul, Turkey, at the International Initiative on Aging for Eastern Europe, Middle East and North Africa (October 4-7).
Together they helped to introduce the topic of longevity research at 3 panels at the Conference – “Human Rights”, “The Pursuit of Longevity” and “Social Perspective of Ageing” and will endeavor to promote the longevity research and advocacy agenda further.
Moreover, a petition was presented to the UN to officially institute the celebrations of the Longevity Day, on October 1 or some other day.
An online version of the petition can be found and signed here:
https://secure.avaaz.org/en/petition/Celebrating_International_
Longevity_Day_during_the_International_Day_of_Older_Persons/
Looking forward to more and stronger concerted actions in support of longevity research and for improving healthy longevity for all around the world!