More than 15,000 centenarians as number doubles in 20 years

THE number of people over 100 years old has more than doubled in the last 20 years, official data show.

A total of 15,120 centenarians were living in England and Wales as of half way through 2022, according to data held by the Office for National Statistics.

This is the largest number of centenarians on record and a 26 per cent increase in five years (11,960), and a more than doubling since 2002 (6,920).

The number of people aged 105 or more has also more than doubled, from around 300 to 640 in two decades.

More than one in six of the over-100s were born in 1920, data show, and turned 100 in 2020, and were products of a post-first World War baby boom.

The number of people aged exactly 100 increased by more than half in 2020 when 6,680 people got a birthday card from the late Queen, up from 4,370 in 2019.

While more than half of the V-day babies have died since turning 100, there were still more than 2,500 alive in 2022.

Four in five of all centenarians are women, reflecting a long-standing trend of women living longer than men, although the percentage is decreasing slightly.

Data also show that there are more than 550,000 people aged 90 or older and only 2.7 per cent of these are over 100. Centenarians account for 0.03 per cent of the general population in England and Wales, with one 100 year old individual for every 3,333 people.

“The historical birth patterns of the large post-first World War cohort (those born between mid-1919 and mid1920) were still affecting the number of centenarians in the population in 2022,” the ONS said in a release.

Stuart Lewis, the chief executive of Rest Less, a digital community for over50s, said: “Paradoxically, while medical advancements during the last century have resulted in an increase in life expectancy globally, this does not guarantee a healthy and disease-free lifespan.

“With increasing numbers of us expected to live beyond 100 and evidence of growing inequality of ageing around the country, it’s important to do what we can to boost our own longevity and future quality of life.”