She was just three, and a toddler running around barefoot in the mud and grass, when a severe flu pandemic swept through poor British Guiana and the West Indies, over a century ago.
Quite simply, there is no one left to remember if little Zorie De Mattos succumbed to fever, caught cold and cold, or showed even the slightest sign of sniffles in what he called “Spanish flu. ”
Mortality was particularly high in children under five years of age. We know that she lived through not only the most deadly outbreak, caused by an H1N1 virus that walled the colony and the world in two waves between 1918-1919, but also everything else since then, starting from the “war to war” end all wars, ”up to the devastating loss of her parents, sister and next of kin, and then last May, to a sudden infection from the newly discovered coronavirus disease that had gone on to kill around 2.7 million (M) people.
On January 1, 2021, as we neared the New Year, the petite Miss De Mattos wore a saucy sky-blue halter dress with sparkling sequins that showed off her smooth shoulders, joining enthusiastic caregivers and a few others from Ward Six in the Palms Geriatrics Home to celebrate its 106th anniversary with a matching tiered icing cake, with individual candles from the three numerals on top.
Awed and shouting nation, like Guyanese from all over, congratulated the senior who has become a legend both online and off, as we offer thanksgiving and blessings in a dark and difficult time, for yet another milestone that marks the woman feisty as a precious man. member of a most exclusive international club.
De Mattos is the wonderfully soft face of a smiling survivor, having made it through an initial attack of COVID-19 with unique genes and the built-in resistance that comes from a difficult age of overcoming illness and adversity in South American tomes. .
His longevity was also underpinned by the dedication and diligence of a small band of staff and a watchful team of Ministry of Health doctors overseeing the public institution in Brickdam. Ms De Mattos has remained there as a State ward since 1969, almost half of her life, and nearly all, having been left by an older brother who could not continue to care for her, only three years from now. At last, British Guiana gained independence.
With the shock of wavy white hair, and the sharp glint in her single clear brown eye, composed Zorie has quietly joined an incredible group of just 75 complete cases checked, as recorded by gerontology experts, from the world’s oldest COVID-19 survivors. . As of yesterday, at least 235 people aged 105 and over were reported to have tested positive for the disease, but many have died and other patients’ cases are reported as incomplete or pending.
Historians estimate that about 12 000 people or nearly four percent of the population of this country died in the 1918-1919 flu pandemic. About 5M people or a third of the world’s population were infected with the virus, as the international death toll increased to 50M with high deaths in the 20-40 age group. According to British Professor David Killingray, Guyana and Belize were severely affected, with a mild case initially reported here in July 1918, likely to reach a ship from Trinidad and Tobago, escalating to “epidemic proportions Throughout the colony.
“The railway, coastal boats and the river system accelerated the spread of the outbreak of infection in the crowded, overcrowded houses of Georgetown, Suddie and New Amsterdam, and among laborers in the dense huts of densely packed and sugar-free sugar plantation estates thick. out along the low coast and mouths of rivers ”with fleeing laborers helping to spread the flu virus, he said in a published paper.
As the globe approaches the latest killer virus, we know that masks are back, social distance is in, and hand washing is mandatory. To date the world’s oldest verified COVID-19 victim is the 113-year-old Marie-Florentine Jousseaume, who died in December last year, while the oldest confirmed COVID-19 survivor is another remarkable Frenchwoman, the senior singer Lucile Randon, renamed Sister. André, a now blind Catholic nun, who self-isolated after a COVID-19 diagnosis but did not experience any symptoms of the virus, was able to observe her 117th birthday in style on February 1.
Sister André is the second oldest authenticated person in the world alive, behind Japan’s record holder, the ever-curious Mrs Kane Tanaka, a cancer survivor twice, loves fizzy drinks and plays math games daily after enjoying her 118th year on the planet on January 2. A third woman, 106-year-old British Mary Nicholson, has twice survived the virus. A super-centenarian is someone who has reached the magic human age of 110, achieved by about one in every 1,000 centenarians.
“[I] I didn’t even realize I had it, ”Sister André told a French newspaper. Likewise, Zorie, who loved helping out at the Palms, made headline news when it became the oldest among three elderly residents, to have overrun the virus. He showed mild to moderate symptoms before recovering quickly, as two others died, and several others between the ages of 55 and 90, took longer to recover. Nurses said the otherwise healthy Zorie had fever and some pains, but made sure she drank lots of fluids, followed a specialist diet and received her Vitamin C boost daily. Sporting a rhinestone tiara and a scepter, he happily asked for photographs in his “I beat Covid-19” t-shirt, proving to admirers that a miracle had happened in Ward Six.
There is a deeper mystery of how so many elderly patients like Zorie De Mattos have managed to conquer a widespread infection that has captured the young and seemingly healthy. The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention puts the risk of dying from COVID-19 at 630 times higher among people over the age of 85 compared to young adults ages 18 to 29. About 121M people are infected, with 68.6 M recovering, but cases are on the rise again with Guyana revealing 51 new cases and another death yesterday of a 66-year-old woman, as death reaches up to 209.
Reporting on shocking research that supercentenaries have higher than typical concentrations of a particularly rare type of “T helper cell” in their blood, the Live Science website explained that these immune cells can offer special protection against viruses, leaving the very old extremely of fine health throughout their life span.
In a small study of Japanese super-canaries, experts found that a large proportion of participants’ immune cells contain the cytotoxic “T helper”, meaning they can voluntarily attack and kill dangerous invaders even though they are usually act as directing commanders. . Although just under three percent of such cells in young people have this ability, in ultrasounds, that number rose to a staggering quarter or 25%.
As geneticists continue to study centenary treasure genomes to determine key traits that could contribute to healthy aging, in the case of Zorie De Mattos if such exploration is ever to be granted, her anonymous family should be honored to learn they are associated with an extremely spicy . Guyanese, who live and prosper through another challenging pandemic. In the words of a nurse, “My daughter Zorie (is) the best patient I’ve had in the Palms…”
ID tries not to think about constantly evolving variants and shortages of vaccines, preferring to hear a Brazilian expert who said, “When people ask me why these people survive, I usually answer it probably because they are a centenary. ”