Down Syndrome: 1 of World’s Oldest Reported People With Chromosomal Disorder to Celebrate 75th

Frances Gillett of Ely, Cambridgeshire, turned 75 on Sunday, news outlets reported. She has also survived breast cancer and tuberculosis. Life expectancy has increased for people with the disorder.

There is some dispute as to who exactly is the oldest person with Down syndrome. In July 2014, Oklahoma woman Dollie Grissom turned 74, and at the time, local media outlets dubbed her the world’s oldest woman with Down syndrome.

In 2012, an 83-year-old man with Down syndrome from Minnesota, Bert Holbrook, died in the town of Waseca. Staff members at his care home had submitted Holbrook’s name and age to the Guinness Book of World Records in 2008, according to the Mankato Free Press.

Orina Ontiri