Secrets of centenarians who defeated coronavirus at the age of 100

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

The danger of death from the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus, which is already used to being called simply covid, is maximum for people over sixty, and even more so at the age of under a hundred (or over a hundred). However, not every grandmother and not every grandfather of the coronavirus manages to overcome when it overtakes them. Several patients of a deeply venerable age shocked the doctors with their vitality.

Defeated Spaniard, Defeated Covid

American Marily Shapiro Escher is remarkable not only for the fact that she has crossed the centenary in her life, but also for the fact that she has safely been ill with two of the most frightening viruses of recent times: the Spanish flu in the early twentieth century and the coronavirus in the early twenty-first. Shapiro Escher was born in 1912 and was still a child at the time of the great Spanish flu epidemic. In fact, she was lucky to get under the very first wave of the disease, with a high fatality rate, but not frightening - she fell ill with the "Spanish flu" at six. During the more deadly second and third waves, Marilee already had the immunity she had acquired from fighting an early strain of influenza.

Shapiro Escher became a successful sculptor, has extensively exhibited in major museums and galleries, and worked throughout the twentieth century. At the age of about ninety, she felt that her physical strength was no longer sufficient to work with hard materials. Marilee learned a new, contemporary art form - digital photography. Of course, from the basics, that is, composition, to processing on a computer to fully embody your idea. And at one hundred and two years old, she decided it was time to look back and take stock of life - and wrote an autobiography.

True, it turned out that life after one hundred and two does not end, so that Shapiro Escher met the next global pandemic - the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus. She was unlucky enough to get sick at the age of one hundred and seven. The doctors provided the sculptor with all the necessary assistance, but they were sure that the woman's chances were close to zero. They called aside Shapiro's daughter Escher to inform her mother that there was no more than half a day left. “They obviously didn’t know my mother,” then her daughter said. Five days later, the recovered Marily was taken home to recover from her illness.

How did she survive two terrible illnesses? When Marilee was six and she was with the Spanish woman, she would get out of bed to look at her father on the first floor. Every time she told herself that if she saw dad, everything would be fine. And this childish self-hypnosis seemed to work (as did Marilee's strong immunity, of course). As for the victory of Shapiro Escher's life force this time, her daughter suggests that it is all about creative activity, which her mother has not yet given up.

Nazi grandfather saw

In Italy, the press and social networks from time to time recall the story of Alberto Bellucci, who three times stood on the brink of death during the Second World War and the cooperation of the Italian fascists and German Nazis - and three times managed to get away from the Nazis. And now he has become the hero of another story - at the age of one hundred and one, he contracted the coronavirus and survived. All relatives call it a miracle.

Like Marilee Shapiro Escher, Alberto Bellucci caught the Spanish flu. He, in fact, was born during an epidemic, in 1918. But he was lucky not to get sick with her. But the coronavirus could not be avoided - the disease in Italy spread with the speed of a supernova explosion, and the elderly especially suffered from it, with whom, according to Italian custom, numerous relatives constantly kiss.

The Bellucci family was very worried about Alberto and especially regretted that he would not die surrounded by loved ones, saying goodbye and embracing his family. Imagine their amazement and happiness when Alberto simply recovered! “I was asked to return, and I returned,” he said of his miraculous salvation.

First record holder

On March 8, 2020, the media was quick to name the record holder for age among those who survived the coronavirus. A 100-year-old Chinese man from Hubei province, hospitalized in the main clinic of Wuhan, became the hero of the news. Doctors gave the pensioner little chance, because he suffered from hypertension, Alzheimer's disease and heart failure. However, after thirteen days of intensive treatment, including blood plasma transfusions and drugs, the patient was able to cope with the disease. His name was never named for the press, but the very fact of defeating the disease with such introductory notes was considered encouraging and inspiring by the doctors.

And the oldest Chinese woman to survive the virus was ninety-eight-year-old Hu Han Yin. The woman was admitted to the hospital with her daughter, fifty-four years old. Both mother and daughter recovered. The medical staff accompanied Hu Han Yin solemnly with flowers.

The vitality of man as a species is generally amazing: 8 pandemics in the history of civilization that could destroy humanity, but people survived.