Can you imagine two brothers who have lived together for more than 108 years?

by Óscar Ribeiro and Laetitia Teixeira

They exist and live in Portugal. Albano (born 14 December 1909) and Alberto (born 2 December 1911) recently completed 108 and 110 years old, respectively. The Guinness World Records recognized them for the “highest combined age of 2 living siblings”. Together the Andrade brothers’ age is of 218 years.

Researchers from the qasp had the opportunity to interview them in 2013 within the PT100 Oporto Centanarian Study (see more @ www.pt100.pt). These brothers were part of a population-based study that included more than 140 centenarians living at the Oporto Metropolitan Area. Since then they have been contacted every 6 months to monitor their condition. Last November the PT100 team visit them and their family with Michel Poulain, one of the founders of the Blue Zones areas to collect information about their genealogy and birth certificates.

The Andrade brothers are a case of interest not only by the singularity of their age, but for the fact that both of them are men, a minority within the centenarian population in most countries, including Portugal.

One of the most recent manifestations of the world's population aging is the rapid growth in the number of people aged 100 and over, especially in more developed countries. Spain and Portugal are prominent countries at this level. According to data from the National Statistics Institutes of both countries, the number of centenarians has been increasing every year. In 2001 there were 589 centenarians in Portugal and 8766 in Spain. In the following Census the numbers increased to 1526 and 10273, respectively. More recent projections for 2015 pointed to the existence of more than 4000 centenarians in Portugal and around 14500 in Spain (Sánchez, 2016; Reis, 2015). In the future, this trend is expected to intensify, to the point that 4.1 million centenarians are projected worldwide for 2050 (United Nations, 2009).

In Spain, Ana María Vela was the person who lived the longest, up to 116 years, being considered the third oldest person in the history of Europe (Sánchez, 2017). Francisco Núñez Olivera, one of the men who reached a longer age, underwent kidney removal surgery at age 90 and at age 98, for a cataract operation (Rego, 2017). He passed away at the age of 113 (Casares, 2017).

Casares, G. (2017). Francisco Núñez, el hombre más longevo del mundo, cumple 113 años "loquísimo y satisfecho de mi alma". El Mundo. Obtido de: http://www.elmundo.es/espana/2017/12/13/5a314886e5fdea69298b46f4.html

Rego, P. (2017). Selfie a los 112 años del hombre más viejo del mundo. El mundo. Obtido de: http://www.elmundo.es/cronica/2017/08/23/599721de46163f19118b45a1.html

Reis, M. (2015). Envelhecimento: Portugal já tem mais de 4000 centenários. Jornal i. Obtido de: https://ionline.sapo.pt/413736

Sánchez, A. (2016). Los 100 años ya no son una barrera. El País. Obtido de: https://politica.elpais.com/politica/2016/01/22/actualidad/1453461841_873727.html

United Nations (2009). United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs/Population Division, World Population Aging. New York: Nações Unidas.