The world’s oldest living person has been revealed – and she is a 116-year-old nun from Brazil.
Sr Inah Canabarro, who was born on June 8, 1908, became the world’s oldest person following the death of a woman from Japan on December 29. LongeviQuest, an organisation that tracks supercentenarians around the globe, said the wheelchair-bound nun’s achievement had been validated by early life records. She ranks as the 20th oldest person to have lived – a list topped by France’s Jeanne Calment, who died in 1997 at the age of 122.
Sr Canabarro has said the secret to her longevity is her Catholic faith. The 116-year-old was born to a large family in southern Brazil and took up religious work as a teenager. She spent two years in Montevideo, Uruguay, before moving to Rio de Janeiro and eventually closer to home in southern Brazil.
The nun was honoured by Pope Francis for her 110th birthday and is now the second oldest nun ever documented, after Sr Lucile Randon, who lived to 118.