Nicoya in Costa Rica: Where People Live Longer

On a recent CNN commercial health reporter Dr. Sanjay Gupta talked about Costa Rica’s Nicoya Peninsula and the town of Nicoya. He said that people live to be 100 years and even older in Nicoya. ABC and other news organizations have had similar reports. Everyone followed up a research by the National Geographic writer Dan Buettner who is also the founder of Quest Network, a longevity researching project for students.

In 2005, a Costa Rican demographer, Dr. Luis Rosero, claimed that of all the people in the world, 60-year-old Costa Ricans can expect to live longest. Academics at the international conference that Dr. Rosero attended didn’t believe him. Therefore, National Geographic’s Dan Buettner gathered a team and started an investigation. They identified several so called “blue zones”, places where people tend to live healthier and longer lives. The town of Nicoya is one blue zone. Here, 100-year-old women chop firewood, make all meals from scratch and wash laundry by hand. As opposed to the men in the U.S, men in Nicoya live to the age of 100 four times as often.

The high life expectancy depends on, among other things, the calcium rich water, the high altitude (thinner air lowers your blood pressure), a diet of exotic fruits and the people’s happy attitude.

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