Wednesday, September 9, 2026 | Edition 194 | Item #3

Last month, Ethel Caterham, the world’s oldest living person, celebrated her 117th birthday. Her life journey has taken her to India, where she served as a nanny to a British family in the days of the Empire, and to Hong Kong, where her husband served in the army. Following her husband’s death a half century ago, Ethel took up driving and later picked up bridge, which she has continued to play actively into her centenarian years. Her advice to all of us is: “When you retire you must stay busy, [you] must find a hobby.”

In theory, that should mean that Caterham’s children should have a good shot at a long life, according to new research from Einstein, Boston University, and Tufts. Researchers pooled three long-running studies — nearly 2,300 offspring of centenarians — and found that having a parent who made it to 100 comes with real, measurable health benefits: a 42% lower risk of death at any given age, 33% lower cardiovascular risk, and 32% lower hypertension risk. Diseases showed up later too: hypertension arrived about five years later on average. Even after adjusting for smoking, diet, exercise, income, education, the health benefits of long-lived parents was still significant. 

Lifestyle still matters of course and it doesn’t apply uniformly (Caterham’s daughters, we are sad to report, have both predeceased her), but offspring of centenarians still seem to have a significant health head start.