Juan Vicente Pérez Mora, Once The Oldest Living Man
OrchestralHuman/Wikimedia CommonsAt 114 years old, Juan Vicente Pérez Mora was the oldest verified man alive in early 2024.
In early 2024, the oldest verified living man in the world is 114-year-old Juan Vicente Pérez Mora, who resides in Venezuela.
Born in 1909, Reuters checked in with him in 2022 and found that, aside from slightly elevated blood pressure and hearing loss, Pérez Mora was feeling well overall. Despite his advanced age, he didn’t even take any medications.
“My dad is in very good health. He does not suffer from any disease that requires medical treatment,” his daughter Nelyda Pérez told Guinness World Records. “The whole family is very grateful for my daddy’s health.”
Public DomainJuan Vicente Pérez Mora and his wife on their wedding day.
So what’s the secret to Pérez Mora’s longevity? Like other supercentenarians on this list, Pérez Mora lived a fairly normal life. The Catholic News Agency reports that he started working around the age of five, helping his father and siblings to harvest sugar cane and coffee. Though his formal education was cut short due to his teacher’s serious illness, Pérez Mora nevertheless learned to read and write, and eventually worked as a sheriff.
Pérez Mora attributes his impressively long life to a number of things. He told Guinness World Records that the secret to his longevity is to “work hard, rest on holidays, go to bed early, drink a glass of aguardiente [a strong alcoholic spirit] every day, love God, and always carry Him in your heart.”
