Anti-ageing regime that brought Dr Lazarus back to life
When he was flabby and 50, the former diabetes expert had an epiphany. Now 84 and living proof his ideas work, he wants to save us all from a miserable old age
THIRTY-FOUR years ago, Norman Lazarus was having lunch with his wife June when he glanced down at the large roll of fat spilling over his trouser waistband. Overweight and unfit, he was heading inexorably towards an old age marred by decades of ill-health and dependence on medication and doctors.
It is almost impossible to reconcile that description with the wiry, smartly dressed man with a trim moustache and neat spectacles sitting before me on Zoom.
“I was lifting another forkful of food towards my mouth when I spotted the bulge,” says Norman, who is now 84. “I just thought, ‘I don’t want to eat this, so why am I eating it?’ I put the fork down and made a decision, supported by my wife, then and there that I would cut back the amount I eat in order to have the best old age possible.”
And that is exactly what he did – word for word. As did June, who is 87 and follows a low-calorie diet, walks regularly and is in the same robust good health as her husband.
According to an NHS survey in 2017, nearly half the population is taking prescription drugs, with millions of pensioners on at least five types of medication.
And this is the future that Norman wanted to spare himself. So he lost weight, started to exercise – at 66 he became the UK Audax Veteran Cycling Champion – and embraced life with new vigour.
Despite being in his ninth decade, he still works as a professor at King’s College London, and is living proof of his theory, backed up by decades of research, that how we age is entirely within our control. It is not some inevitable fate.
“It is not a question of genes – and I am not talking here about people who have terrible diseases such as Parkinson’s. Those cannot be prevented with a good lifestyle.
“I am talking about heart disease, diabetes, stroke, high blood pressure or dementia – there are a list of them in my book – and people who as a result are dependent on non-curative drugs and health carers. I want to stay independent and not be a drain on loved ones or the medical profession.”
Norman’s new book,The Lazarus Strategy: How To Age Well And Wisely, argues that exercise and sensible eating are vital for our physical and mental wellbeing.
The World Health Organization predicts that by 2050 there will be two billion people over 60 with 434 million of those over 80 years of age.
BUT, says Norman, who lives near London, there is a catch: the quality of those extra years of life will be shockingly poor. We are not ageing well nor wisely.
Norman is a professor at the Centre for Human and Applied Physiological Sciences at King’s College and, following his medical training, held various positions in the Wellcome Trust including
Head of Diabetes Research, Biochemical Research and Cell Biology. He worked in the Department of Health as head of the section dealing with the effects of natural and added chemicals in food.
Norman says we need to make changes from the age of 50. “But it’s never too late and that’s what I want to tell Express readers. Reducing what you eat and exercising will help you whatever age you are. It benefits not just our muscles and lungs, but our immune and hormonal systems, cholesterol levels and organs, thanks to the extra blood being pumped around the body.”
But one thing Norman doesn’t do is judge or preach. Try to get a view from him on
‘Of course I still fancy a slice of fruit cake but if I feel an urge coming on I go out for a walk’
the morality of the NHS spending millions of pounds on patients with preventable diseases, and you get short shrift.
“No, I’m not going there,” he snaps. “I believe in the NHS and its ability to treat everyone for free. As a doctor you can’t discriminate. But you reach the age where on the horizon you get a hint that maybe this is not going on for ever, things are going to change. We need more awareness of the changes we have to make.”
Which is not to say that those who are deaf to it don’t frustrate him.
“Listen, I remember as a young doctor treating a man with serious circulation problems caused by smoking and he was sitting up in bed on the ward smoking, as you could do in those days,” says Norman.
“It might really anger me but sometimes it’s not possible for some people to give up smoking, they’re addicted and it’s not for me to say, ‘Just give up’.”
His tolerance comes in part because his older brother, Lesley died in his 70s “because he was a smoker and suffered a lifetime of illnesses as smokers do.” It is one of the reasons why he doesn’t pronounce on others’ lifestyle choices.
“I was born in 1935. Smoking was part of the social culture and we were told it was good for us to smoke. Can you imagine that now? It wasn’t until the 1960s that we realised how damaging smoking is.”
Norman eats just 1,800 calories a day when the NHS guide is 2,500 for men and 2,000 for women.
He sticks to a strict routine: porridge in the morning, a slice of wholemeal bread and protein (cheese usually) for lunch and then a protein-heavy dinner such as chicken, fish or vegetables. He never eats pudding or snacks between meals. He goes to the gym three or four times a week, as well as cycling, and starts every day with core exercises to strengthen his back and stomach. This requires herculean reserves of self-restraint.
“Yes, and I am lucky that I have an inner strength I draw on,” Norman says. “Of course I still fancy a slice of fruit cake with my coffee but if I feel an urge coming on, I go out for a walk until it subsides.”
It all sounds, well, a little monastic and devoid of fun? “I still eat out in restaurants,” he says. “But if I do then I skip lunch or have a small salad.”
Perhaps it has a lot to do with Norman’s upbringing in remote South Africa: “One had to enjoy oneself in those far-off places,” he says. “For me it was quite easy. I lived a lot in my mind.”
Might some people prefer to go out with a bang, as it were? “Well, they might,” he says, “and that’s up to them – I’m not here to dictate to anyone – but the chances are they will have decades of ill-health and a miserable time. I have had so many wonderful experiences I wouldn’t have had if I had died younger or spent these decades feeling ill.”
Obesity is Britain’s ticking time bomb and Norman says that the way to turn the tide is by example. “Without naming names, if the leaders and influential people we see on TV lost weight and exercised more it would encourage normal people to do the same.”
As a scientist who draws on data, not hypotheses, for his book, he will not be drawn on reported links between obesity and coronavirus. In fact he doesn’t want to talk about the pandemic at all.
“I am not qualified to talk about it. It is early days, but I will say that general good health is always better when it comes to fighting off any disease or infection.”
Norman had always wanted to be a doctor since his early childhood in a far-flung mining community, the middle one of three children. “It was 36 miles to the nearest town, and therefore the nearest doctor,” he recalls. “I must have fancied myself as a doctor even
though I had never seen a doctor until I got chickenpox at the age of about five or six. The only thing I remember was the doctor pulling out a large fob watch and looking at it for what seemed to be ages. I thought, ‘I must try this’.”
Norman improvised and cut the straps off his mother’s prized wrist watch to resemble the doctor’s pocket watch and set about taking his younger sister Sheila’s pulse. “My father owned the only shop, a general store, and the mining community came in for everything from dress material to sweets to boot polish.” His mother made “remedies” to treat her children and soon she was dispensing advice to the locals. “It was amateur stuff, like putting warm olive oil and garlic in your ear for earache, or creams to treat cuts and stings. If it was serious she’d call the doctor.”
Sheila, despite being four years younger, also predeceased her brother from heart valve problems. Norman qualified as a doctor in South Africa, but moved to the University at Buffalo in New York state to do his PhD.There he met his British wife, June, an immunologist, and in 1970 the couple moved with their two children to the UK. He has experienced many different cultures but his message is clear when it comes to dieting: stick with what you know.
“If I suddenly went on a Japanese breakfast diet, eating raw fish, that would not last because it would be too difficult. All faddy diets require added hard work when just eating less is hard enough. So stick to the food you know and like, just eat a healthier, smaller portion of it.”
He recommends taking up any exercise that gets you a little bit out of breath, be it brisk walking or ballroom dancing because it will help, as long as you do plenty of it regularly.
Norman hopes his book, the result of a lifetime’s work, will be a wake-up call to the middle-aged that might trigger the epiphany he had at that lunch all those years ago. But, ever the pragmatist, he says: “Listen, if you don’t want to do these things, that’s fine. You have to help yourself. But if you don’t, then I assure you, the last 25 years of your life are going to be miserable.”
Realising this sounds rather negative, he adds brightly: “Whatever you choose to do must give you joy.”
‘I’ve had so many wonderful experiences I wouldn’t have had if I had died younger or spent decades feeling ill’