A French nun, who is now the oldest person in the world, has shared the secret to a long life: A glass of wine every day and chocolate. At 118 years and 73 days, Sister André was given the title of the world's oldest person by the Guinness World Records (GWR) on Monday.
Sister André was already the oldest woman in Europe when she turned 117, but after the death of Japanese woman Kane Tanaka, the title was conferred upon her.
The GWR said on its website that she was born on February 11, 1904, as Lucille Randon. She looked after children as a governess and became a nun during World War Two in 1944.
Sister André was alive during the First World War, the Spanish Flu of 1918 and became the world's oldest COVID-19 survivor in 2021. She was quoted by The Guardian as saying last year that she “didn't even realise I had it”.
For the past 12 years, Sister André has been living in a nursing home in Toulon and spent the peak of the pandemic last year in her room.
The record for the oldest person ever is also held by a French woman named Jeanne Louise Calment who lived to be 122 years and 164 days old. She too used to take a glass of wine every now and then and had a particular fondness for chocolate.
Sister André now wants to break that record. She thinks to herself that Calment's record "is within reach, if she's going to stay on Earth, she might as well make it," David Tavella, the nun's confidant, told news agency AFP.
She received a letter from Pope Francis, as well as from newly re-elected French President Emmanuel Macron. Toulon's mayor Hubert Falco told Sister André that she was "an object of pride and an example to the whole world".
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