如何才能健康地退休 A slow exit from the workforce is the healthier way to retire
A colleague from the financial world recently announced on Facebook that he had retired to the woodsy north-east of the US and that he was looking forward to spending his days fishing and hiking in a sylvan landscape far from Wall Street.
一位金融圈的同仁最近在Facebook上宣佈，他已退休，搬到了林木茂盛的美國東北部，期待着能在遠離華爾街的森林風光中垂釣、徒步，消磨時光。
I, of course, wished him well, but I had to wonder what the medical record shows for people who have unplugged from their busy careers and left behind a mentally stimulating life.
當然，我希望他一切安好，但我想知道對那些突然離開繁忙的職業生涯並將那段激情燃燒歲月拋在身後的人來說，他們的醫療記錄如何。
This is not an idle question: as the baby boomer generation ages, the number of people of retirement age in the US is projected to double from 36m in 2003 to 72m in 2030. Governments everywhere are debating whether and how far to raise the age of eligibility for state pensions because of the effect on the public purse.
這並不是一個毫無意義的問題：隨着嬰兒潮一代逐漸變老，美國退休年齡人口數量預計將從2003年的3600萬翻倍至2030年的7200萬。由於擔心對公共財政的影響，世界各國政府都在討論是否提高領取國家養老金資格的最低年齡，以及提高到多大年齡。
It turns out that health studies of retirement are a mixed bag. One study in 2012 that received a lot of attention came from the Harvard School of Public Health. It looked at 5,422 individuals in the US and found there was a 40 per cent increase in heart attacks and strokes among those who had retired, compared with those of a similar age still working.
事實證明，對人們退休後健康問題的研究結果是五花八門的。哈佛大學公共衛生學院(Harvard School of Public Health)2012年的一項研究引起了許多關注。該研究觀察了5422名在美國生活的個人，發現與仍在工作的同齡人相比，退休人羣心臟病發作和中風的比例高出40%。
Perhaps even more striking, the study found that most of the cardiovascular events happened in the year after retirement. When I contacted the lead researcher of the study, J Robin Moon, a sociologist now working on health systems in the Bronx, a poor borough of New York City, she said her statistical analysis might reflect “reverse causality”: in other words, people may have been forced to retire because they already had cardiovascular disease, not the other way around.
或許更令人吃驚的是，該研究發現，大多數心血管疾病發生在退休後一年。當我聯繫到該項研究的首席研究員、如今在布朗克斯（Bronx，紐約市的一個貧困區）從事衛生體系工作的社會學家J圠賓莫恩(J Robin Moon)時，她說自己的統計分析可能反映出一種“逆向因果關係”：換句話說，人們可能是被迫退休，因爲他們已經患上心血管疾病，而非相反的關係。
Those who were only semi-retired — working part-time — had substantially less risk of a heart attack. So Ms Moon ponders whether the ill-health effects have something to do with the US way of retirement, where people enter a life “that is completely different from what you’re used to with so many changes, socially and economic”.
處在半退休狀態（有兼職工作）的人，心臟病發作的風險大大降低。所以，莫恩在想，退休後健康欠佳的情況是否與美國人退休的方式——人們進入另一種生活，“與他們此前習慣的完全不同而且伴隨如此多……身體上、社會和經濟變化”——有些關係。
In contrast, a number of studies in Europe have had results very different from the Harvard research. A multiyear study of the pension system in Germany found that retirement “has a positive effect on health, increasing the probability of reporting to be in satisfactory health and mental health” and even reducing the number of visits paid to the doctor.
相比之下，歐洲的許多研究得出了與哈佛的研究截然不同的結果。德國一項針對養老金制度的多年研究發現，退休“對健康有積極影響，提高了報告身心處於良好健康狀態的概率”，甚至減少了看醫生的次數。
Likewise, a study in France of 11,246 men and 2,858 women found that retirement was associated with a “substantial reduction in mental and physical fatigue and depressive symptoms”.
同樣，法國一項對1.1246萬名男性和2858名女性的研究發現，退休與“身心疲勞及抑鬱症狀的大幅減少”有關聯。
Of course, poor health does not happen overnight, even though events such as heart attacks and strokes are usually recorded as sudden events. Volumes have been written comparing the typical French diet with its US counterpart, which often contains more sugar and less fresh fruit and vegetables.
當然，健康問題並不是一夜之間出現的，儘管心臟病發作和中風等狀況通常被視爲突發疾病。有很多關於法國和美國典型飲食結構的對比研究，後者往往包含更多的糖、較少的新鮮水果和蔬菜。
Another fascinating insight Ms Moon gleaned in an unpublished study was that people who are retired but have frequent contact with neighbours and friends tend to be healthier.
莫恩在一項未公佈的研究中還發現了一個有趣現象：已經退休但經常與鄰居、朋友接觸的人身體通常更加健康。
If you can form social bonds and enjoy a smooth transition from full-time work to not working at all, the cardiovascular health effect was mediated. “Retirement is not the toxic factor, it’s the things that come with it,” she concludes.
如果你能建立自己的社會關係並實現從全職工作到完全退休的平穩過渡，將可以調和退休對心血管健康的影響。“退休並非有害因子，危害健康的是與之相伴而來的問題，”她總結說。
