Medical experts are scratching their heads as another elderly person has mysteriously passed away this week. Newspapers the world over shared the sad news that the World’s Oldest Person has just died. This is the latest in a rash of similar news stories.
Just last month, Besse Cooper, at the time the World’s Oldest Person, died quietly in her bed at a Monroe, Ga. nursing home. She was a spry 116 years old.
Sadly, barely two weeks later, another sweet woman, Dina Manfredini, from Johnston, Iowa, who with Besse’s passing had become the reigning World’s Oldest Person, barely had time to enjoy her newly bestowed crown and scepter before she too passed away, at the age of 115.
Dina’s heir apparent’s tenure as World’s Oldest Person was apparently every bit as brief as Dina’s, because last week this shocking headline appeared: Koto Okubo Dead: World’s Oldest Woman Dies at 115, describing a frail, quiet Japanese woman who passed away peacefully in her sleep at her nursing home. Koto had barely had time to thank the awards committee before she too fell victim to this unbroken curse.
Ingrid Jørgensen, a retired school crossing guard from Trondheim, Norway, at age 114 has just been crowned the newest World’s Oldest Person. Ms. Jørgensen is reportedly feeling rather uncomfortable with the news of her achievement, insisting it must be an accounting error. She claims her neighbor Heidi Fjelstad is several months older than she and therefore is the person who should be recognized, not her. (Norwegians are notoriously modest.)
The passing of Koto Okubo, Miss World’s Oldest Person for the week of January 20, is the latest victim to punch a one-way ticket on the Hereafter Express. Until now, there has been scant evidence that any government leaders or world scientists have made any efforts to combat this outbreak, which cruelly appears to target only the very oldest and most frail among us. Lest anyone think the latest deaths are isolated coincidences, Nate Silver, the uber-statistician who correctly picked all 50 states in last year’s presidential election, places the odds that the current World’s Oldest Person will die within the next twelve months at 97.5%. Friends of Norway’s Ingrid Jørgensen have reportedly urged her not to put off her once-in-a-lifetime vacation to Greece until next summer.
Millions of senior citizens are up in arms, arguing that this health crisis has been ignored for far too long. The AARP pointed out recently that the United States spends billions of dollars on wars in the Middle East but has invested almost nothing to try to stop the revolving door of World’s Oldest Persons falling prey to the Grim Reaper.
Recent World’s Oldest Person honorees like Besse, Dina and Koto have tended to be shy about shining the spotlight on this global crisis. They tend not to complain, which may be in part due to the fact they’re deceased. But AARP representatives are urging Americans to fight for these helpless elderly victims and are asking people to write their congressperson to demand that they find a cure once and for all for this mysterious affliction that is targeting the most senior of our senior citizens.
As one AARP spokesperson bluntly put it, “Our leaders must stop turning a blind eye as our World’s Oldest Persons continue to die off one by one. If we don’t do something about it, eventually all of us may suffer the same fate.”
Well, in a country where elderly and disabled people more commonly die from hypothermia, starvation, and state instigated violence, dying of old age is seen as unusual!
Something needs to be done.
Funny