Chinese Woman, 95, Found Alive in Kitchen Days After Being Presumed Dead

A 95-year-old woman in China, believed by her village to have died, was discovered calmly cooking in her kitchen six days after being placed in a coffin, in a case doctors attribute to an extremely rare condition known as "artificial death."

A village in China's Guangxi province was stunned when a 95-year-old woman, believed to have passed away, was found alive in her home days after her funeral preparations had begun.

Li Xiufeng was discovered unresponsive by a neighbor who brought her breakfast in February 2012, following a recent fall. Unable to wake her and detecting no breath, the neighbor presumed she had died. According to local tradition, her body was placed in a coffin inside her home for a multi-day vigil before burial.

Six days later, when the neighbor returned to check on the home, he found the coffin empty. A search led to the kitchen, where Li Xiufeng was found sitting on a stool, preparing a meal. She reportedly told her shocked neighbors, "I slept for a long time. After waking up I felt so hungry and wanted to cook something to eat."

Doctors who later examined her concluded she had experienced "artificial death," an extremely rare condition where vital signs become undetectable but the person remains in a deep, coma-like state. "Thanks to the local tradition of parking the coffin in the house for several days, she could be saved," one doctor noted.

While her life was spared, local customs required the burning of a deceased person's belongings. Consequently, all of Li Xiufeng's possessions had already been destroyed.

The case echoes other rare medical anomalies in history, such as a 1915 incident in South Carolina where a woman sat up in her coffin at her own funeral. Li Xiufeng's "resurrection" remains a remarkable anecdote in her village, highlighting a tradition that inadvertently saved her life.