Worldwide, the number of confirmed Coronavirus cases is reaching 700,000 with more than 30,000 deaths. And one-third of the death toll came from Italy. With 10,023 deaths from the Covid-19, Italy continues to lead the chart with Spain at second place (6,606 deaths). At the same time, the number of confirmed cases is about to breach the 100,000 mark in Italy.

 

Despite the gloom and doom, a 101-year-old man – identified only as “Mr. P” – has miraculously recovered from the deadly Coronavirus. The Italian man was apparently admitted to a hospital in the northeast city of Rimini last week after testing positive for Covid-19, only to leave the hospital on Thursday after successfully beating the virus.

 

Gloria Lisi, Rimini’s deputy mayor, said the recovery of Mr. P was “truly extraordinary” and inspired “hope for the future”. She said – “Mr. P. made it. The family brought him home yesterday evening. To teach us that even at 101 years the future is not written.” On the same day the century-old man left the hospital a healthy man, Rimini registered 1,189 cases of Coronavirus.

So, how did a 101-year-old man beats the Coronavirus when older people and people with chronic illness are the most vulnerable to the disease? In Italy, a country with one of the world’s oldest populations, a recent analysis carried out by the national health institute found that of all the patients who died from the virus, the average age was 81.

 

Similarly, while the rate of death among confirmed cases is 4% (according to World Health Organization), an estimate from Imperial College London says that the death rate is almost 10 times higher than average for those over 80-years-old, and much lower for those under 40. The death rate also depends on how well a country conducts testing and spots for the virus.

 

While many elderly people had fallen ill and subsequently died from the Coronavirus, Mr. P has made a stunning recovery probably because he has a weapon that other old people didn’t possess. The Italian man was born during the Spanish flu pandemic. Also known as the 1918 flu pandemic, the unusually deadly influenza pandemic had infected 500-million people worldwide.

That was about a quarter (25%) of the world’s population at the time. Lasting from January 1918 to December 1920, the pandemic is estimated to have killed between 30 million to 50 million people worldwide. Some said the death toll was as high as 100 million, making the Spanish flu one of the deadliest pandemics in the human history.

 

While scientists know a lot about flu viruses, very little is known about the new Coronavirus and the disease it causes, officially known as Covid-19, because it’s so new. However, both seasonal flu viruses (which include influenza A and influenza B viruses) and Covid-19 are contagious viruses that cause respiratory illness.

 

Typical flu symptoms include fever, cough, sore throat, muscle aches, headaches, runny nose, fatigue and, sometimes, vomiting and diarrhea. The most common symptoms of Covid-19 coronavirus disease, meanwhile, are fever, tiredness, aches, sore throat and dry cough. Obviously, both flu and coronavirus appear to demonstrate some similar symptoms.

But while both flu and coronavirus target the respiratory system, Coronavirus spread more slowly than the flu. The flu can sometimes cause a secondary infection, usually pneumonia. Coronavirus, on the other hand, leads to about two more secondary infections on average, and almost all serious consequences of Covid-19 feature pneumonia.

 

Therefore, perhaps Mr. P, who survived the Spanish flu about 100 years ago, has developed some sort of immunity or defence system which quickly gets activated when he was infected by the flu’s cousin – Coronavirus. But Mr. P isn’t the oldest Italian who had beaten the virus. A 102-year-old woman in the northern Italian city of Genoa had also recovered recently.

 

Nicknamed the “Highlander” by doctors who treated her, Italica Grondona was hospitalized in early of March for “mild heart failure”. After more than 20 days in the San Martino hospital in Genoa, Italica was discharged on March 26. Doctor Vera Sicbaldi said – “She only had some mild coronavirus symptoms, so we tested her and she was positive, but we did very little, she recovered on her own.”

Like Mr. P, it appeared Italica Grondona is also a survivor of Spanish flu. The doctor said – “We got serological samples, she is the first patient we know that might have gone through the ‘Spanish flu’ since she was born in 1917”. However, there’s another case of a century-old woman who had also defeated the same virus in China – a 103-year-old Zhang Guangfen who lives in Wuhan.

 

Madam Zhang was admitted to hospital in Wuhan on 1 March during the outbreak of Coronavirus. But 6 days later, she was discharged and sent home. Her incredible recovery has been credited to the fact she had no serious health conditions, aside from mild chronic bronchitis. But Zhang Guangfen wasn’t alone. Another man – 100 years of age – had also recovered from Covid-19.

 

The 100-year-old Chinese man with heart failure, Alzheimer’s and hypertension was admitted to a hospital in Wuhan on 24 February. On 7 March, he was discharged after being treated by military doctors. While documents showed very few have died in China due to the Spanish flu, some believed it was because the Chinese had already possessed the immunity to the flu virus.

Last Thursday (March 26), a 97-year-old South Korean woman has made a similar incredible recovery from the Coronavirus, becoming the oldest person in the country to survive the infection. While the woman’s identity was not revealed, she is reported to be from the southeastern city of Cheongdo, a city near to Daegu, the epicentre of the South Korea’s outbreak.

 

Perhaps it’s true what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. For now, the oldest person to recover from Coronavirus is a 103-year-old Zhang Guangfen. Hopefully scientists will not take turns putting them into experiment chambers or laboratories to extract whatever blood or plasma left of them to create new drugs.

 

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March 30th, 2020 by financetwitter

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