FYI.

This story is over 5 years old.

Food

The World's Oldest Woman Says the Secret to Long Life Is Raw Eggs, Staying Single

Rather than depending on the healing powers of Miller High Life or fresh-picked produce, Morano says that her ability to span three centuries all comes down to… raw eggs. Yep, just like Rocky.
Hilary Pollack
Los Angeles, US
Foto via Olivier Morin/AFP/Getty Images

Despite being sought—and mythologised—for millennia, the fountain of youth remains elusive (though Keanu Reeves seems to have found it). Death is life's only true certainty, besides taxes, anyway, but we keep hoping to put it off indefinitely, or at least crawl deep into centenarianism.

Which is why we're always asking the world's oldest people what their deal is. Is it rubbing their faces with blood, à la Kim Kardashian? Or maybe drinking three Miller High Lifes and a shot of whiskey every day, as one 110-year-old woman recently suggested?

Advertisement

After the former world's oldest person—Susannah Mushatt Jones—passed away last Thursday at the age of 116, many people wondered who would be next in line for the title. Jones attributed her long life to family, generosity toward others, and a diet heavy in fresh fruits in vegetables thanks to her aunt's farm, where she grew up.

READ MORE: This 110-Year-Old Lady Says Whiskey and Cheap Beer Are The Keys to Longevity

But the new oldest person in the world, 116-year-old Emma Morano of Verbania, North Italy, has a decidedly different approach. (She's also the last documented remaining person on Earth to have been born in the 19th century.)

Rather than depending on the healing powers of Miller High Life or fresh-picked produce, Morano says that her ability to span three centuries all comes down to… raw eggs. Yep, just like Rocky.

When she was a teenager, a doctor recommended that she drink three raw eggs to treat her anemia, and she has keep to it since… meaning, for 100 years (although she's now down to two eggs a day.) As a 2015 New York Times profile about Morano points out, that comes to more than 100,000 eggs over the course of her lifespan so far. She also continues to eat bananas, and "soupy pasta" with ground meat. Say what you want about how eating meat shaves years off your life, but Morano seems to be doing just fine with her egg- and meat-heavy diet.

And good news, single ladies: Morano also says that remaining single since the end of her first marriage in 1938 has also contributed to her vitality. Although she was pursued by many men after the split, she "didn't want to be dominated by anyone," she told the Times.

That's good advice. And as Rocky could tell you, maybe the eggs help with that, too.