Jiroemon Kimura, aged 116 years is not only the oldest person alive but after the death of the second oldest person, James Emmanuel 'Doc' Sisnett, he is also the only living man born in the 19th century.
Jiroemon Kimura, who is 116 years old, is the oldest living person today. After the death of the second oldest person, James Emmanuel 'Doc' Sisnett, who died last week at the age of 113, Kimura is the only "man" born in the 19th century who is still alive.
According to a report by the Gerontology Research Group at UCLA, 21 women born before 1901 are still alive, with the oldest woman, aged 115 year residing in Japan. Others are residents of the United States, Europe and Canada.
Kimura was born on April 19, 1897 and retired after 45 years of service in the Japanese post office in the year 1962 at the age of 65. He has five children, 14 grandchildren, 25 great-grandchildren and 13 great-great-grandchildren, reports the New York Times.
Kimura's longevity may be due to his genes, along with his diet, says ABC News. "People who live to that age are incredibly heterogeneous, as if they have some key genetic features in common that get them to an incredibly old age," Tom Perls, from Boston University Medical Center, told ABC.
According to Perls, 90 percent of the people who go on to live for so many years have two X chromosomes that protects against diseases. "If one chromosome has some less-than-desirable aging or disease genetic variance, women seem to have the ability to choose a variant on the other chromosome that is more conducive to survival," he told ABC.
Kimura, however, is not the oldest person to have ever lived. The oldest woman who ever lived was a122-year-old Frenchwoman named Jeanne Calment, who died in 1997.
