World’s oldest man dies in New York, aged 111

The world’s oldest man, a retired chemist and parapsychologist, has died in New York City, aged 111.

A niece of Alexander Imich said he died on Sunday at his home in Manhattan.

Karen Bogen, of Providence, Rhode Island, had visited him a day earlier.

She said his health declined about two weeks ago and he did not recognise her.

Mr Imich was born in 1903 in a town in Poland, then part of Russia. He and his wife fled after the Nazis invaded in 1939 and moved to the United States in 1951. His wife died in 1986.

In news reports, Mr Imich said good genes and a general healthy lifestyle contributed to his longevity.

He credited good genes for his long life, saying his father had lived into his 90s.

“But the life you live is equally or more important for longevity,” he told the Reuters news agency.

He said in an interview last month that his favourite foods were chicken and chocolate.

Mr Imich, a trained chemist, was a scholar of the occult. In 1995, he edited an anthology called Incredible Tales Of The Paranormal.

Guinness World Records are investigating the claim that 111-year-old Sakari Momoi, of Japan, is now the world’s oldest man.

The world’s oldest living person and oldest woman, Misao Okawa of Osaka, Japan is 116 years old; she was born on March 5, 1898.

The longest a person has been known to live, at least an age that could be authenticated by Guinness World Records, is 122 years and 164 days; that person, Louise Calment of France, was born on February 21, 1875, and died in Arles, France, on August 4, 1997.