Delhi, 23 August 2026: The world's oldest living woman, Ethel Caterham, celebrated her 117th birthday with family and friends in Surrey. Ms Caterham, who lives at Hallmark Lakeview Home in Lightwater, became the world's oldest living woman after the death of Brazilian nun Sister Inah Canabaro Lucas (116 years).
In April 2025, he became the world's oldest living person. Born three years before the Titanic disaster and eight years before the Russian Revolution, Ethel has also seen two world wars.
According to Guinness World Records, he is one of the oldest people to be infected with Covid-19. He was infected with this virus in 2020, at the age of 110. Ethel, originally from Shipton Bellinger in Hampshire, grew up in Tidworth, Wiltshire, the second youngest of eight siblings.
One of the few surviving figures from the reign of King Edward VII, he came to India as a teenager in 1927 and began working for a military family.
Ethel met her husband Norman (who was a Lieutenant Colonel in the British Army) at a dinner party in Britain in 1931. The couple later settled in Hong Kong, where they started a nursery school.
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