Coronavirus: 101-year-old Italian man makes 'extraordinary' recovery from Covid-19

A 101-year-old Italian man has recovered from coronavirus, in a miraculous story that his city's deputy mayor said provides "hope for the future”.

Gloria Lisi told CNN reporters the man, identified as “Mr. P”, had made an "extraordinary" recovery.

Mr. P. made it. The family brought him home yesterday evening.

To teach us that even at 101 years the future is not written.

Incredibly, the man is so old that he was born during the Spanish flu pandemic, which killed between 30 and 50 million people worldwide. As of Friday, the coronavirus has killed more than 25,000 people, with 100,000 confirmed cases in the US alone.

More than 8,000 of the deaths have been in Italy, which has become the centre of the pandemic. The man’s recovery is especially miraculous given that older people are particularly vulnerable to the virus.

In the UK, people over 70 years old have been advised to “self-isolate” inside their homes for 12 weeks. The World Health Organization has called on people to protect "the collective wisdom" of society by looking out for seniors during the pandemic.

The Italian man isn’t the only centurion to overcome the disease. An 103-year-old woman and a 100-year-old man in China also beat the disease this week.