centenarian

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A centenarian is a person who has attained the age of 100 years or more. Because current average life expectancies across the world are less than 100, the term is invariably associated with longevity. Much rarer, a supercentenarian is a person who has lived to the age of 110 or more, something only achieved by about one in a thousand centenarians. Even rarer yet is a person who has lived to 115 years old; only 1 in 50,000 centenarians make it to this age.

Current incidence

The United States currently has the greatest number of centenarians in the world, estimated at 96,548 on November 1, 2008. ^[1] The U.S. number is partly a function of America's large population in 1890–1910, large farm population a century ago, and an increased emphasis on long-term care facilities.

Japan is second, with 36,276 in September 2008.^[2] Many experts attribute this (and Japan's very high life expectancy) to the Japanese diet, which is particularly low in fats and to hygienic practices. In addition, five times the rate of Okinawans live to be 100 than the rest of Japan.^[3] In addition to diet, there are four other factors that have been found to increase the life expectancy for Okinawans, as noted later in the "research into centenarians" section of this article. ^[4]

France has the highest rate of centenarians in percentage of the total population: 20,115^{[citation needed]} centenarians in metropolitan France for a little less than 62 millions inhabitants^[when?], or 1 centenarian for 3,076 people. The rate is 1 per 3,522 in Japan^[5] (but much higher in Okinawa), and 1 per 3,300 in the United States.^[6]

Traditions

107 year old Chaldean man from Mosul, Iraq, 1895

• In the United States, centenarians traditionally receive a letter from the president upon reaching their 100th birthday, congratulating them for their longevity. NBC's The Today Show show has also named them on air since 1983.
• In the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth Realms, the Queen sends greetings (formerly as a telegram) on the 100th birthday and on every birthday starting with the 105th.
• Centenarians born in Ireland receive a €2,540 "Centenarians' Bounty" and a letter from the President of Ireland, even if they are resident abroad.^[7]
• Japanese centenarians receive a silver cup and a certificate from the Prime Minister of Japan upon their 100th birthday, honouring them for their longevity and prosperity in their lives. In Japan, September 15 is "National Respect for the Aged Day".
• Among Hindus, people who touch the feet of elders are often blessed with "May you live a hundred years".
• In Sweden, the traditional birthday song states, May he/she live for one hundred years.
• In Israel, the term May you live to be 120 years old is used for blessing someone.
• In Poland, Sto lat, a wish to live a hundred years, is a traditional form of praise and good wishes.
• Chinese emperors were hailed to live ten thousand years.
• In Italy, "A hundred of these days!" (cento di questi giorni) is an augury for birthdays, to live to celebrate 100 more birthdays. Some Italians say "Cent'anni!" which means "a hundred years," in that they wish that they could all live happily for a hundred years.
• In Greece, when wishing someone Happy Birthday, they will end the birthday wishes with the expression "na ta ekatostisis" which literally means "hundred them" but can be loosely translated as "may you make it one hundred birthdays".

Centenarians in ancient times

While the density of centenarians per capita was much less in ancient times than today, the data suggest that reaching the age of 100 was not impossible then. Though ancient demographics are biased in favor of wealthy or powerful individuals rather than the ordinary person, it is unscientific to suggest that "ordinary persons" lived longer. Grmek and Gourevitch speculate that during the Classical Greek Period, anyone who made it past the age of five years — surviving all the common childhood illness of that day — had a reasonable chance of living to a ripe old age. Life expectancy at 400 B.C. was estimated to be around 30 years of age. One demographer of ancient civilizations reported that Greek men lived to 45 years (based on a sample size of 91), while women lived to 36.2 years (based on a sample size of 55). Curiously, the gender statistics are inverted compared to today, since child-birth was a much more traumatic experience at that time than now, and it certainly skewed female statistics downward. It was common for average citizens to take great care in their hygiene (sanitation), Mediterranean diet (fish, figs, olive oil, wine, etc.), and exercise program (sports/gymnasium), although there was much more male trauma per capita than today, due to military service being virtually universal for citizens. This also biased the statistics for men downward.^[8]

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Diogenes Laertius (c. 250) gives the earliest (or at least one of the earliest) references about (plausible centenarian) longevity given by a scientist, the astronomer Hipparchus of Nicea (c. 185 – c. 120 B.C.), who, according to the doxographer, assured that the philosopher Democritus of Abdera (c. 470/460 – c. 370/360 B.C.) lived 109 years. All other accounts about Democritus given by the ancients appear to agree in the fact that the philosopher lived over 100 years. Such longevity would not be dramatically out of line with that of other ancient Greek philosophers thought to have lived beyond the age of 90 (e.g.: Xenophanes of Colophon, c. 570/565 – c. 475/470 B.C.; Pyrrho of Ellis, c. 360 - c. 270 B.C.; Eratosthenes of Cirene c. 285 – c. 190 B.C., etc.). The case of Democritus differs from the case of, for example, Epimenides of Crete (VII, VI centuries B.C.) who is said to have lived an implausible 154, 157 or 290 years, depending on the source.

The sixth dynasty Egyptian ruler Pepi II is believed by some Egyptologists to have lived to the age of 100 or more (c. 2278 BC - c. 2184 BC), as he ruled for 94 years.^[9] However this is under dispute, as others claim the date should actually be 64 years.^[10]

The Indian Sufi poet, Kabir (1398-1518?) is believed by some to have lived to an unnatural age of 120 while others believe that he lived for no more than 80 years.

Ultimately, there is no reason to believe that there could not have been a few individuals who were centenarians 2500 years ago, even if they were not commonplace.^[11]

Hosius of Córdoba, the man who convinced Constantine the Great to call the First Council of Nicaea, reportedly lived to age 102.

The Chronicon of Bernold of Constance records the death in 1097 of Azzo marchio de Longobardia, pater Welfonis ducis de Baiowaria, commenting that he was iam maior centenario^[12].

Future of centenarians in the United States

The examples and perspective in this article or section might have an extensive bias or disproportional coverage towards one or more specific regions. Please improve this article or discuss the issue on the talk page.

The Huffington Center on Aging at the Baylor College of Medicine in Houston is another source for information about centenarians.

As reported on the front cover of USA Today of August 24, 1999, The U.S. Census Bureau has forecast that the number of Americans aged 100 or older will increase by more than 22 times the 1990 estimate of 37,306. In October 2001, the US Census Bureau actually reported that there were 50,454 US centenarians (a more reasonable 35 percent increase) out of a total population of 281.4 million Americans. The Allstate insurance company reported that, in 2007, the Hallmark company sold approximately 85,000 "Happy 100th Birthday!" cards. But by 2050, "the number of US centenarians is expected to reach 834,000 and maybe even 1 million," said Dr. Robert Butler, President of the International Longevity Center in New York City.

From present data, the number of worldwide centenarians is around 450,000. However, if one considers only the total number of supercentenarians, this number falls dramatically to an estimated 300 to 450 worldwide, of which only approximately 80 are validated.^[13] Only one person, Jeanne Calment, has been indisputably proven to have lived for at least 120 years. Shigechiyo Izumi's claim of having reached 120 years is disputed. Despite the fact that there are a large number of pretenders from other countries, these claimants have never been rigorously validated by means of the sort of documentation that would be sufficient to prove their claim (birth certificates, baptismal certificates, marriage certificates, and so forth). However, record keeping was never rigorous before the age of data processing. Persons born at home in rural areas were considered fortunate if they had a family Bible to record their birthdate, let alone the correct spelling of the parents' names, their ages at the time, etc.

The Social Security Administration extended the life expectancy tables up to age 119 in 2005.^[14] In the course of the last four decades, the number of people reaching 100 has increased almost tenfold, so that now one in fifty women and one in two hundred men reach that age. This fact, in addition to the increase in birth and immigration of younger cohorts, leads to common errors in interpreting life expectancy.

Research into centenarians

Research carried out in Italy suggests that healthy centenarians have high levels of vitamin A and vitamin E and that this seems to be important in guaranteeing their extreme longevity.^[15] Other research contradicts this, however, and has found that these findings do not apply to centenarians from Sardinia, for whom other factors probably play a more important role.^[16] A preliminary study carried out in Poland showed that, in comparison with young healthy female adults, centenarians living in Upper Silesia had significantly higher red blood cell glutathione reductase and catalase activities and higher, although insignificantly, serum levels of vitamin E.^[17] Researchers in Denmark have also found that centenarians exhibit a high activity of glutathione reductase in red blood cells. In this study, those centenarians having the best cognitive and physical functional capacity tended to have the highest activity of this enzyme.^[18]

Other research has found that people having parents who became centenarians have an increased number of naïve B cells. It is well known that the children of parents who have a long life are also likely to reach a healthy age, but it is not known why, although the inherited genes are probably important.^[19] A variation in the gene FOXO3A is known to have a positive effect on the life expectancy of humans, and is found much more often in people living to 100 and beyond - moreover, this appears to be true worldwide.^[20]

Men and women who are 100 or older tend to have something else in common, an extroverted personality, says Thomas T. Perls, M.D., M.P.H., the director of the New England Centenarian Study at Boston University. Centenarians will often have many friends, strong ties to relatives and a healthy dose of self-esteem.^[21]

Some research suggests that centenarian offspring are more likely to age in better cardiovascular health than their peers.^[22]

In John W. Santrock's book "A Topical Approach to Life-Span Development" there are five factors that research has suggested that are most important to longevity in centenarians^[4]: 1) heredity and family history 2) health, i.e. weight, diet, whether or not a person smokes, amount of exercise 3) education level 4) personality 5) lifestyle.^[4]

The book also noted that the largest population of centenarians are women who have never been married.^[4] Also, people who have been through traumatic life events, such as Holocaust survivors, learn to cope better with stress and poverty and are more likely to reach centenarian status.^[4]

In Okinawa, Japan, studies have shown several different factors that have contributed to the large number of centenarians there.^[4] The five factors are: 1) diet that is heavy on grains, fish, and vegetables and light on meat, eggs, and dairy products 2) low-stress lifestyles, which are proven significantly less stressful than that of the mainland inhabitants of Japan 3) caring community, where older adults are not isolated like many other cultures and are taken better care of 4) high levels of activity, where locals work until an older age than the average age in other countries, and more emphasis on activities like walking and gardening to keep active 5)spirituality, where a sense of purpose comes from involvement in spiritual matters and prayer eases the mind of stress and problems.^[4]

Although these factors vary from those mentioned in the previous study, the culture of Okinawa has proven these factors to be an important consideration in the large population of centenarians in Okinawa.^[4]

Numbers of centenarians

See also

• List of centenarians
• Oldest people
• Queensland Community Care Network for the 100+ Club
• Research into centenarians
• New England Centenarian Study
• Okinawa Centenarian Study

References

External links

• Centenarians’ Road
• The Okinawa Centenarian Study
• New England Centenarian Study
• Salt of the Red Earth: Wit, wisdom and portraits of 100 Oklahoma centenarians
• Living to 100 and Beyond: Search for Predictors of Exceptional Human Longevity
• Mortality of Centenarians
• Purple Medical Blog Predictors of Reaching 100 Years Old..How To Live A Long Life.. A Quiz
• U.S. politicians who lived the longest
• Noted Nonagenarians and Centenarians
• Centenarian research & celebration
• Table of numbers of centenarians for select nations, 1960 and 1990
• The Island of the Ancients by Ben Hills {Pub 2008 : Secrets of Sardinia’s Centenarians}
• Photographs of Sardinia’s Centenarians by Mayu Kanamori
• Newest Centenarian Photography Book Moonblinx Gallery and Publishing: Jahrhundertmensch Buch by Karsten Thormaehlen, Frankfurt 2008 (ISBN 978-3-00-025096-5)
• Centenarians Also Tweet!

Reference Koch Tina, Charmaine Power, & Debbie Kralik (2005) 100 Years Old 24: Australian Centenarians Tell Their Stories Viking / Penguin