The world’s second oldest woman has died at the age of 116 at a nursing home in Japan, officials said.
Fusa Tatsumi, who was Japan’s oldest person, passed away on Tuesday at the care facility in Osaka after eating her favourite meal of bean-paste jelly.
Born in April 1907, Tatsumi raised three children with her husband, a farmer, in Osaka, local broadcaster MBS reported.
‘Tatsumi died aged 116 at a care facility in Osaka on Tuesday,’ an official in Osaka’s Kashiwara city said, as tributes to the supercentenarian poured in.
‘I think she did great to get to this age,’ Tatsumi’s eldest son, Kanji, 76, told local media.
Fusa Tatsumi, who was Japan’s oldest person, passed away on Tuesday at the care facility in Osaka after eating her favourite meal of bean-paste jelly
Osaka governor Hirofumi Yoshimura offered his condolences, recalling a party he attended to celebrate Tatsumi’s longevity in September.
‘I still remember how healthy Ms Fusa Tatsumi was,’ Yoshimura said. ‘I sincerely pray for her soul.’
In footage aired by local media outlets she was seen in a wheelchair, mostly sleeping, at her 116th birthday celebration in April.
Tatsumi became Japan’s oldest person in the country after the death of a 119-year-old woman, Kane Tanaka, in April 2022.
She was the second oldest woman in the world, after that of US-born Maria Branyas Morera, who will turn 117 on March 4 next year.
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