Maria Esther de Capovilla - officially the world's oldest woman - has died in Ecuador aged 116, relatives said.

Capovilla died at dawn on Sunday in the coastal city of Guayaquil after succumbing to pneumonia. Her funeral was planned for Monday.

Born in 1889, the same year as Charlie Chaplin and Adolf Hitler, Capovilla was 22 when the Titanic sank and 79 when astronauts first set foot on the Moon.

Her family said donkey milk might be key to her longevity.

Capovilla was born in Guayaquil, to a well-to-do Ecuadorean family which traced its ancestry to the Spanish conquistadores.

Maria Esther de Capovilla - officially the world's oldest woman - has died in Ecuador aged 116, relatives said.

Capovilla died at dawn on Sunday in the coastal city of Guayaquil after succumbing to pneumonia. Her funeral was planned for Monday.

Born in 1889, the same year as Charlie Chaplin and Adolf Hitler, Capovilla was 22 when the Titanic sank and 79 when astronauts first set foot on the Moon.

Her family said donkey milk might be key to her longevity.

Capovilla was born in Guayaquil, to a well-to-do Ecuadorean family which traced its ancestry to the Spanish conquistadores.


that sounds a little revolting, but hey, it may be a key to longevity.  :o

I wonder if a lifetime spent watching donkey shows will have a similar longevity-enhancing effect?  :D

Now they only said 'might' be the key.............. 

Now they only said 'might' be the key.............. 
As if it was might, what kind of milk could it had otherwise been?

Five of the 'oldest' people in the world have died in the last 3 years...

Who's stepping up to the position next? ???

Remember, it's hard to say just who is the oldest person alive because reaching back even 100 years ago, birth records not so well-kept as they became after WWI.  Vital statistics was a much shakier field.  So Guiness and other sources who want to remain reputable will only list the most verfiable super-centennarians (those who have attained 110 year+). 

The record held by the late Jeanne Calment (France) of 122 years and change is excepted by Guiness as verified.  However, Guiness has called into question a previous record held by the late Shigechiyo Izumi of Japan, who died in 1986 at the age of 120.  They accepted the documentation as Izumi's longevity star was rising in the early '80s, but later scholars began to argue about it.  Longevity scholars are now crediting the Dane Christian Mortensen, who died at age 115, to be the longest living male.
Who knows? I think it is possible and even likely that some old dude born on the Steppes of Pakistan lived to be 125, but there's no way to prove it without birth records that come up to scholarly snuff.

If I can find the articles, I'll link to them, but geneticists--so I've heard--have theorized 110 years is the upper limit of the human life span, judging by DNA replication in the lab (I believe that's what it was), so if a person lives beyond that, it's a genetic anomaly.  If I had to wager I guess as to the terminal limit a genetic anomaly could possibly go in human years, I'd say 150 absolute maximum.  Could be wrong and I probably am!

Aside from the Book of Genesis, you see legendary men and women reputed to have gained great ages in centuries past.  Just one example,  the famous Englishman Thomas Parr ("Old Parr") who died in 1635 at the reputed age of 152.  This is bunk, of course.  Back in 17th century Europe, folks didn't attain ages such as 80 and 90 years old so regularly as they do today.  Thus, if you had a man or woman in your town who was so old he or she was in the memory of your grandparents, and no living person could remember a time when old Mr. or Mrs. So-and-So wasn't around, then the temptation to inflate age is great.  "Oh, that old fogey must be 150 years old!"  Of course, they had baptismal records and so forth, but maybe the records got lost or destroyed.  Once the record was gone back then, it was gone for good.  Thus, the farmer Thomas Parr maybe died at the age of 90 when the other "old" people were dying at 60.  That kind of thing.

As the anthropologists studying the Himalyan Hunzas, noted for their longevity, pointed out:
We find a lot of 50 and 60-year-olds, and a lot of 100 to 130 year olds, but were are all the 70, 80, and 90 year olds?
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i think people living  till 100 will increase over the next few decades

i think people living  till 100 will increase over the next few decades

My grandfather died at the age of 100.  Do I want to live to be 100?  No thanks.

I take the attitude of the longer you, the more pension you can claim.

Do we look at the sad side (that she died) or the happy side (that she lived a long time)?

Unless you're extrordinarily healthy, if you live 90 to 100+ years, the last several are too much suffering to bother with.  Three of my grandparents were so old and sick for so long, that by the time they died, it was more relief than grief.  It's sad their not in this world any longer, but at least they're not suffering anymore.  The exception of my four grandparents was my paternal grandfather who blew his own brains out Ernest Hemingway style at the age of 37, decades before I was even born!
:P

Unless you're extrordinarily healthy, if you live 90 to 100+ years, the last several are too much suffering to bother with.  Three of my grandparents were so old and sick for so long, that by the time they died, it was more relief than grief.  It's sad their not in this world any longer, but at least they're not suffering anymore.  The exception of my four grandparents was my paternal grandfather who blew his own brains out Ernest Hemingway style at the age of 37, decades before I was even born!
:P


Everything I read about medicine in the near future(next 50 years) indicates that life expectancies will still be rising. Many people say "man, I wouldn't wanna live to be 90!", however, in the future if medicine will be advanced enought for the average life span to increase by a good bit, you'd have to figure that it would also improve the quality of life in later years. If the average age of death were to be 90, I'd suspect 75 will be quite a bit different than it is now.

Predictions, shmredictions.

My maternal grandmother's family and my paternal grandfather's family have a history of longevity. My grandmother's parents lived to be 91 and 88, respectively. Her father was born in 1896, I think, and her mother in 1906, and they respectively died in 1986 and 1994. Actually, her grandmother didn't die until the early-mid 1970s, and was born in 1880 in Poland! 

Everything I read about medicine in the near future(next 50 years) indicates that life expectancies will still be rising. Many people say "man, I wouldn't wanna live to be 90!", however, in the future if medicine will be advanced enought for the average life span to increase by a good bit, you'd have to figure that it would also improve the quality of life in later years. If the average age of death were to be 90, I'd suspect 75 will be quite a bit different than it is now.

Meh, I think this was something the O.T. was right on, three score and ten, then hang it up.  I don't want to be obliged to to yoga and macrobiotics (bleccch!) just to add another fifteen years to my carcass.  Don't spend a hundred grand trying to keep my sorry old azz alive an another 36 months just 'coz I insisted on living 'till I'm crippled and crazy at age 92.  Invest that money in the young people instead.  They can use it.  I figure if I can't get it done in seven decades, it's not going to get done, so I'll tip my hat, run down the current and join the choir invisible!

I'm not saying you should do the same.  That's just my sentiment.  I might start bargaining for an extension as the time appears on the horizin in another quarter century, who knows?
;D

Hmm, people who live to be 120 years old, probably can't even move and would break every bone in your body from the slightest accident. If I was that old I would wake up every day saddened at the fact that I'm still alive. Besides I'm sure that all of your loved ones and friends would have died long before.

Look on the bright side, everybody you hated is dead too!
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I'll stick with 80, 90 maybe pushing it, but the rate I'm going, 50 will be a major achievement!

116 is... very old. Rather live fast, die young than live cautiously and die at 116.

Look on the bright side, everybody you hated is dead too!
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"I'll have to watch everyone around me die. I don't think this is right. This is not a dream. This is a nightmare!"

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