Longevity advocates to rally in 15 cities, demanding governments treat aging as a medical emergency
The April 8 coordinated action calls for dedicated public funding and a regulatory pathway for anti-aging therapies, two things that currently do not exist anywhere in the world.
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A new international campaign will bring demonstrators into the streets of twelve cities simultaneously on Wednesday, April 8, demanding that governments begin treating aging as a treatable medical condition rather than an inevitability.
Fund Longevity, the grassroots non-profit behind the action, is coordinating rallies in Amsterdam, Berlin, Brussels, Ljubljana, London, Madrid, Mexico City, Paris, Rome, San Francisco, Stockholm, and Austin. Organizers say it is the first internationally coordinated longevity rally in history.
The campaign centers on two specific demands. First, a large-scale increase in public funding for aging research, with an explicit policy goal of making aging a treatable condition. Second, the creation of a dedicated regulatory pathway for therapies that target aging itself, not merely individual diseases caused by aging.
Neither exists today. Private investment in longevity science reached approximately $1.7 billion in 2025. Zero governments have a dedicated aging research programme.
That gap is the core of the organizers’ argument. Aging is estimated to kill roughly 110,000 people per day worldwide, and it is the primary underlying risk factor for cancer, cardiovascular disease, dementia, and most major non-infectious diseases. Despite this, the field employs fewer than an estimated 1,000 people working on it full-time globally.
“We have the science. We have private capital starting to move. What we don’t have is political urgency,” said Linus Petersson, who co-founded the initiative alongside Andrei Panferov. Both are based in Stockholm. “Aging kills more people every day than any war, pandemic, or natural disaster. Governments should be treating this as the emergency it is.”
The scientific case underpinning the campaign has been accumulating for years. More than 200 researchers, including geneticist George Church and clinical researcher Nir Barzilai, have signed the Dublin Longevity Declaration, which states that aging is not biologically inevitable and that biological age is modifiable. A Nature Aging article by Scott et al. estimated that a slowdown of aging equivalent to a single year of life expectancy would generate $38 trillion in economic value to the US economy alone.
The organizers point to recent signals from the United States — where longevity-sympathetic officials have been appointed at HHS, FDA, and ARPA-H — as a “promising start, but not nearly enough.” Companies including Retro Biosciences, NewLimit, and Altos Labs have raised billions of dollars to target the biology of aging. AI is compressing drug discovery timelines further.
Organizations supporting Fund Longevity include the Swedish Longevity Cluster, the Vitalism Foundation, the Longevity Biotech Fellowship, Heales, the International Longevity Alliance, and LEVITY. Expert backers include Aubrey de Grey of the LEV Foundation, Ilia Stambler of Bar Ilan University and the International Longevity Alliance, and Patrick Linden, author of “The Case Against Death” (MIT Press).
Fund Longevity describes itself as a non-profit grassroots movement, not an industry lobby.
Attend or watch: Rallies take place April 8, 2026. Livestream runs 17:00–18:00 CEST on YouTube. Details and city locations at fundlongevity.org.
Editor’s note: Fund Longevity was co-founded in Stockholm, with backing from organisations including the Swedish Longevity Cluster and age.house, a community closely aligned with ours. We’re covering it because the ideas deserve serious consideration, not as an endorsement.
Disclaimer
This content is for informational and educational purposes only and is not medical advice. Always consult a qualified healthcare professional before making changes to your health.