According to a statement, former US president Jimmy Carter will “spend his remaining time at home” receiving hospice care.
The 98-year-old, who served as president from 1977 to 1981, decided to end his medical treatments, the Carter Center reported on Saturday.
Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter today chose to spend his remaining time at home with his family and accept hospice care rather than further medical attention, according to a statement from the Carter Center.
“His family and medical staff are fully behind him. The Carter family requests privacy at this time and is touched by the concern displayed by his devoted following.
By defeating outgoing President Gerald Ford in 1976, Mr. Carter, a Democrat, was elected as the 39th President of the United States. In 1980, Republican Ronald Reagan beat him after a single term in office.
He is the oldest living former president in American history and continues to reside in a humble house in the little Georgian town of Plains, which is 2.5 hours south of Atlanta.
In 2015, Mr. Carter underwent liver surgery to remove a tiny malignant tumor. And in 2016, he declared that he would no longer require medical care because an experimental medicine had cured his cancer.
The other previous presidents who are still alive are Bill Clinton, 76, George W. Bush, 76, Barack Obama, 61, and Donald Trump, 76.
Former Georgia state senator Jason Carter, the grandson of Mr. Carter, tweeted that his grandparents were “at peace.”
“Yesterday, I visited with both of my grandparents. They are at ease, and their house is as always filled with affection. I appreciate all of your warm comments,” he tweeted.
Following his cancer diagnosis in 2019, the former president, a lifelong Baptist, told a church Sunday school congregation that he was “at ease with death,” according to CBS News.
“Of course, I prayed about it. I just requested God to give me a healthy attitude toward death rather than to grant me a wish to live. And I discovered that I was fully at ease with death,” he stated, as quoted in press accounts.
I honestly didn’t care whether I lived or died. Since then, I’ve been utterly certain that my Christian faith includes full assurance of life beyond death. I’m going to live again once I pass away, but I have no idea what form I’ll take.
Prior to entering politics, Mr. Carter worked as a peanut farmer and a lieutenant in the US Navy. From 1971 to 1975, he was governor of Georgia for one term.
For his work promoting peace around the world, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002. He has also long supported and volunteered for Habitat for Humanity.
