MOSCOW, September 26 (RIA Novosti) - About 6,800 Russians are centenarians and over 350,000 are 90 years old and older, the head of the Russian Research Institute of Gerontology said Wednesday.
In Moscow about 18,000 Muscovites reached the 90 mark, Vladimir Shabalin said.
He added that Russia's oldest person is Varvara Semennikova, 117, from diamond-rich Yakutia, in Russia's Far East. She has claimed to be the world's oldest living person since August 2007, however, her age has not been verified by Guinness World Records.
France holds the record for the world's oldest person with Jeanne Calment, who died in 1997 at the age of 122.
