AN AMERICAN man weighing 100 stone at his peak is still the world's heaviest person over half a century later.

Despite his staggering weight, 600-calorie vegetable diets, and respiratory problems, taxi driver Jon Brower Minnoch attempted to live a normal life, stating that he was "in no way handicapped".

Jonhad suffered from severe obesity from birth, coming to weigh an impressive 21 stone in 1953, aged 12.

But his problems really began 10 years later, when his marriage to Jean McArdle was accompanied by a drastic increase in his weight and he shot up to 28 stone.

In 1966, and three years into his marriage, Jon weighed 50 stone.

10 years later, he weighed almost 70 stone.

read more on obesity

KILLER RISK

Teenage obesity increases the risk your child will develop 17 different cancers

TROLLS V ROLLS

I’m fat & love showing off in a bikini – trolls say I'm promoting obesity

The pair went on to break the record for the greatest weight disparity between a married couple – with Jon weighing 12 times his 8 stone wife in 1978.

Smashing this record came with its costs, and the heart and respiratory problems that Jon's weight was causing forced him to seek advice from a doctor.

He was told to lose weight, and was put on a prescription of a 600-calorie-a-day diet of nothing but vegetables.

Jon also took large doses of a diuretic to eliminate excess fluids in his body – to very little avail.

Most read in Health

HANDS, FACE, SPACE

China brings back masks & social distancing over mystery outbreak

BUG BEAR

‘Brutal’ virus that ‘lasts for weeks’ and is ‘worse than winter bugs’ sweeps UK

FLU FEARS

First human case of new swine flu strain found in UK as medics try to stop spread

BREAKTHROUGH

NHS consultants reach six-figure pay deal that could finally end strikes

He immediately began to feel weak, and spent three weeks bedridden before he finally listened to his wife and called a hospital.

An army of firefighters had to destroy a window in Jon's home to be able to place him on a thick piece of plywood to transport him to hospital.

It took a team of a dozen firemen, numerous rescue personnel, the specially modified stretcher, and thirteen attendants to get Jon to the University of Washington Medical Center, Seattle.

He was eventually admitted, and told that he was suffering from heart failure, respiratory failure, and a massive edema – a condition where the body has accumulated excess extracellular fluid.

Due to his ailing health it was impossible to weigh him with scales, but consultant endocrinologist Dr Robert Schwartz estimated that Jon weight sat at around 100 stones.

Dr Schwartz stated that he was probably more than that, and that he was 300 pounds heavier than the heaviest person ever reported – at least.

Jon was kept in hospital for two years and put on a strict diet of 1,200 calories. He was eventually discharged after his weight dropped to 34 stone in 1980.

The impressive 66 stone drop was the largest that had been recorded at the time, and filled Jon with hope for his future.

After being released from hospital, Jon said he hoped to eventually reach a weight of 15 stone.

He said: "I've waited 37 years to get this chance at a new life".

Jon and Jean divorced in the same year.

It didn't take long for the taxi driver to start gaining weight again, and he was readmitted to hospital just over a year later whenhis weight rapidly shot to 68 stone.

It was reported that he had managed to gain 14 stone within a week.

Fiercely resilient, Jon tried his hardest to continue with every-day life, and married his second wife, Shirley Ann Griffen, in January 1982.

Jon tragically died soon after remarrying, in September 1983.

His death certificate suggested that his immediate cause of death was cardiac arrest, but respiratory failure and lung disease were also contributing factors.

At the time of death he weighed 57 stone.

He had to be buried in a wooden casket made of plywood 20mm thick and lined with cloth.

The coffin took up two cemetery plots and it has been claimed that 11 men were required to transport it to his burial place.

Across the pond, the UK's heaviest man has said he is lucky to be alive after his extreme weight caused a series of mini-strokes.

Holton became the UK's heaviest man after 65st Carl Thompson died in 2015.

He weighs 45 stone and consumes up to 10,000 calories a day – four times the recommended daily average for a British man.

In 2020 he collapsed and had to be airlifted by crane from his mother's third floor flat by a team of more than 30 firemen and engineers.

Two years later he suffered a series of mini strokes and a suspected blood clot.

In an interview with The Sun, he confessed to being "addicted to food" and said he had "given up on himself".

Meanwhile, the world's former fattest living man can no longer claim the title after shredding a whopping 52 stone.

Juan Pedro Franco dropped from 93 stone to just under 41 in three years.

Previously he had been bedridden and at risk of death, but now he can move freely with far fewer restrictions.

Source: Read Full Article