ScienceDaily has a better piece on recent research into telomere length and aging in nematode worms: "For successful aging you have to control both, aging in your dividing cells, which hinges on telomere maintenance, but also aging in your non-dividing cells. We thought that telomeres might play a role in the latter but that's clearly not the case. What is probably playing a role in the other half of aging is the insulin signaling pathway, proper mitochondrial function and dietary restriction ... To prevent accelerated aging in an organism, you need to have both proper telomere maintenance and those other genetic pathways intact. If you wanted to develop a drug to combat aging it wouldn't be enough to target telomeres, you would also have to target these other genetic pathways."
Link: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2005/08/050805175722.htm