Remarkable concordance in associations between epigenetic clocks and health behaviors across three countries.

Abstract

Research utilizing epigenetic clocks has accelerated in recent years, but it is largely unknown how consistently these measures perform across country and cultural contexts, and thus, how useful they are for understanding the large differences in health outcomes across countries. We assess epigenetic aging in three countries (the US, Ireland, and Northern Ireland) utilizing survey data from each country and evaluated how these measures are associated with three well-studied health behaviors (heavy alcohol use, smoking, and BMI). In general, we found remarkable consistency across these studies, suggesting epigenetic clocks are potentially highly useful for monitoring health and aging processes in different contexts. More research is needed on other health risks and in non-Western and low- and middle-income countries.