Just a week before her 115th birthday, the oldest person in the world has died on the southern Japanese island of Okinawa.

Kama Chinen was born on May 10, 1895, living to see three different centuries, according to the Gerontology Research Group.

She died on Sunday in a care home, although the details of her death have not been released by her family who have closely guarded her privacy.

Okinawa has a reputation for its long-lived residents, put down to the local diet of green tea, miso soup, vegetables, rice and fresh fish.

Kama had been the world’s oldest person since September 2009, when 115-year-old Gertrude Baines died in Los Angeles.

The title of oldest human now passes to 114-year-old Frenchwoman Eugenie Blanchard, who was born in February 1896.

Britain’s Florence Emily Baldwin from Leeds is now the second oldest person alive – she is also 114.

While she attributes her long life to an egg sandwich every day, experts suspect a life of no drinking, no smoking and hard work has played its part.

(Source: Sky News / YWN-112)