Leading a nation takes years off life, study suggests

New research may offer a consolation prize for whichever presidential nominee comes up short next November: Losing could mean a longer life.

Whether heads of government die prematurely is a long-debated question, and research has yielded conflicting results. For example, one study held that presidents might age twice as quickly as the overall American population while in office. Another study found no significant effect on the life expectancies of American presidents.

Now, the largest statistical study of its kind, examining elections held in 17 countries from 1722 to 2015, has found that elected heads of government lived 2.7 fewer years and experienced a 23 percent greater risk of premature death than the defeated office seekers. The BMJ, a British medical journal, published the paper in its Christmas issue, which traditionally features peer-reviewed papers that examine quirky topics.

The analysis tested the hypothesis that elected presidents, prime ministers and chancellors experience accelerated aging and premature death because of the stresses of political life. The authors compared 279 elected heads of government from the 17 countries with the 261 runners-up whom they defeated and who never served as heads of state. The researchers determined the number of years each competitor lived after the last election in which they ran, and compared the findings with the average life span for an individual of the same age and sex in each candidate’s country during the election year.