Doctors find the secret of long life: winning an Oscar

The key to a longer life has finally been unveiled by medical researchers in Canada. It is not a mystery elixir. Nor is it a commandment forbidding, drinking, snorting, smoking or anything vaguely fun and unhealthy. There is a much simpler way of ensuring longevity: go win yourself an Oscar.

The key to a longer life has finally been unveiled by medical researchers in Canada. It is not a mystery elixir. Nor is it a commandment forbidding, drinking, snorting, smoking or anything vaguely fun and unhealthy. There is a much simpler way of ensuring longevity: go win yourself an Oscar.

This is the entirely serious conclusion of a study by two professors at the University of Toronto, published yesterday in the journal Annals of Internal Medicine. Their research shows that Oscar-winners have on average lived about four years longer than their Oscar-deprived peers.

It has to do, apparently, with inner peace and the conviction that you are appreciated. "Once you get the Oscar, it gives you an inner sense of peace and accomplishment that can last for your entire adult life, and that alters the way your body copes with stress on a day-to-day basis," said Dr Donald Redelmeier, who co-authored the study with Sheldon Singh.

True, we have had some pretty aged Oscar-winners. Sir John Gielgud, awarded the coveted statuette for Arthur, lived until he was 96. George Burns ( Sunshine Boys) kept on to 100. And Anthony Quinn, ( Viva Zapata) is still with us at 96.

Better still, of course, gather several Oscars on your mantelpiece and you might find yourself with an extended reprieve from the Grim Reaper. Jack Nicholson will presumably be alive and kicking for several more decades ­ he has collected three Oscars.

The study included all 762 actors and actresses who have ever been nominated for a starring or a supporting role and compared their life spans with actors of roughly the same age who appeared in the same film as the nominee.

Being nominated without actually winning apparently made no difference to longevity. Only winning does.

Will only an Oscar do it? What about a Pulitzer Prize for journalists? Or first prize in the giant cucumber category at the village fair?