The proliferation of popular books, as well as innumerable public consultations and official reviews of government policy, suggests that the future development of the sciences of ageing is presently a matter of considerable public interest. Some of the proposals advanced in this context are radical. Not only do some bio-gerontologists equate ageing with the totality of the life course from cradle to grave and then call for comprehensive health policy programmes to manage such totality, but they also call for a radical reorganisation of biomedical research more generally. Tiago Moreira and I are examining diverse aspects of this proposal, focussing especially on developments in the United States and the United Kingdom out of which it has emerged. In so doing, we engage critically with claims that contemporary governmental forms are in the throes of fundamental change to a bio-political mode of governance and that this is due in large measure to developments in the biomedical sciences.