GROWING OLDER

You can usually tell by looking at people roughly how old they are. As we get older, parts of the body change. An adult’s body is a different shape from a child’s body, as well as being larger. A young adult will usually have( proportionately) less fat and more muscle than a child. As a person gets older, the replacement of dying cells in the body becomes less efficient. In young people the skin is smooth, but as they age it becomes creased and wrinkled, and often becomes duller in appearance. Elderly people tend to be come long-sighted, so if you are short-sighted now, your vision may improve with age. A girl’s breasts grow larger as she matures. In boys the penis and scrotum increase in size. Both sexes grow pubic hair.

·        Hair colour is produced by pigments. When the body stops making these the hair turns white or grey, usually in older people. Men lose their hair more often than women, although no one is quite certain why it happens.

·        Bones grow for your first twenty years of your life. After reaching their maximum length, they then begin to shorten again. That is why old people get smaller.

·        Cancers are caused by abnormal and uncontrolled cell growth: the younger you are, the more vigorous the cell growth will be if you get it. Elderly people whose cell growth has slowed down have a better chance of surviving cancer.