World’s oldest person, Maria Branyas Morera, dies aged 117

Born in San Francisco, California, in 1907, and after spending time in Texas and New Orleans, the family returned to their native Spain in 1915 amid the First World War, which complicated their Atlantic voyage. The crossing was marked by tragedy when her father succumbed to tuberculosis near the end of the journey, and his coffin was buried at sea.

Branyas moved to Catalonia with her mother when she was seven, where she spent the remainder of her life. In 1931, she married Catalan doctor Joan Moret, with whom she had three children – 11 grandchildren and many great-grandchildren. Her husband passed away in 1976, and she also outlived her son August, who died in a tractor accident at the age of 86, according to GWR.

On Monday, Branyas, who had spent the last two decades living at the Santa Maria del Tura nursing home in the town of Olot in northeastern Spain and mentioned in a recent post that she was feeling weak. “I feel weak. The time is coming. Don’t cry, I don’t like tears… You know me, wherever I go, I will be happy.”

Branyas, who experienced the 1918 flu pandemic, both World Wars, and Spain’s civil war, contracted Covid-19 in 2020 shortly after her 113th birthday. Despite being confined to her room at the nursing home, she made a full recovery.

Her youngest daughter, Rosa Moret, attributed her mother’s longevity to genetics, stating, “She has never gone to the hospital, she has never broken any bones, she is fine, she has no pain,” in an interview with regional Catalan television in 2023, Reuters reported.

Branyas became the world’s oldest person in January 2023 and celebrated her 117th birthday on March 4. She credited her remarkable longevity to a combination of luck, good genetics, and a life marked by “order, tranquillity, good connections with family and friends, contact with nature, emotional stability, no worries, no regrets, lots of positivity, and staying away from toxic people.”

“I think longevity is also about being lucky,” said Branyas, who later in life used a voice-to-text device to communicate.

Her X account is called “Super Catalan Grandma” and her bio reads: “I am old, very old, but not an idiot.”

At 117, Branyas was the eighth-oldest verified person in history. The oldest ever recorded was Frenchwoman Jeanne Calment, who lived to be 122 years and 164 days old.

The title of the oldest living person now belongs to Japan’s Tomiko Itooka, born on 23 May 1908, who is currently 116, according to the US Gerontology Research Group.