Authorities in Japan have admitted almost 200 people aged 100 or over are missing, as embarrassed officials struggle to locate all of the country’s oldest residents ahead of a national holiday honoring elderly citizens.
The number of people unaccounted for grew this week after officials in Kobe said they had lost track of 105 of the city’s 847 centenarians.
The 105 include 18 “super-centenarians” — among them a 125-year-old woman whose registered address was turned into a park in 1981 and who would be older than the woman recognized as Japan’s oldest citizen, 113-year-old Chiyono Hasegawa.
In Osaka, 64 of 857 centenarians are missing. Officials in the city said on Thursday that one of them, a man registered as 127 years old, had in fact died in 1966.
Japan’s failure to maintain accurate records of its oldest citizens is being blamed on antiquated record-keeping, strict privacy laws and weakening family and community ties.
“It is shocking that even relatives don’t know if their parents are alive or dead,” said Professor Yoshinori Hiroi, a specialist in public welfare at Chiba University. “These cases were typical examples of thinning relationship among families and neighbors in Japan today.”
The discovery that so many elderly people are missing has sparked fears of widespread pension fraud in one of the world’s fastest-graying societies.
The Japanese Health Ministry is investigating the whereabouts of 840 people over the age of 85 in connection with potentially fraudulent pension claims. The inquiry was launched after police discovered the mummified corpse of Sogen Kato, listed as Tokyo’s oldest man, in his family home 32 years after his death. Relatives have been arrested on suspicion of abandoning a body and receiving millions of yen in pension payments after his unreported death.
Days later came the discovery that a 113-year-old woman listed as Tokyo’s oldest resident had not been seen by her family for more than 20 years. Welfare officials have yet to locate Fusa Furuya, who was last seen in about 1986.
With many of Japan’s 47 prefectures yet to report the results of their search, the number of missing people is expected to rise.
The fiasco is partly a symptom of Japan’s impressive life expectancy — 86.4 years for women and 79.6 years for men. The country has 40,399 centenarians, more than triple the number a decade ago. According to one projection, that number will rise to well over half a million by the middle of the century.
The gaping hole in local government records came to light as officials attempted to update records ahead of “Respect for the Aged Day” on Sept. 20, when residents who have turned, or are about to turn, 100 receive a silver chalice and congratulatory letter from the prime minister. This year the gifts, which have often been sent by post in the past, will be handed to the recipients in person.
Experts have called for reform of the registration system, which does not require face-to-face contact to verify an individual’s address.
Archeologists in Peru on Thursday said they found the 5,000-year-old remains of a noblewoman at the sacred city of Caral, revealing the important role played by women in the oldest center of civilization in the Americas. “What has been discovered corresponds to a woman who apparently had elevated status, an elite woman,” archeologist David Palomino said. The mummy was found in Aspero, a sacred site within the city of Caral that was a garbage dump for more than 30 years until becoming an archeological site in the 1990s. Palomino said the carefully preserved remains, dating to 3,000BC, contained skin, part of the
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
TRUMP EFFECT: The win capped one of the most dramatic turnarounds in Canadian political history after the Conservatives had led the Liberals by more than 20 points Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday pledged to win US President Donald Trump’s trade war after winning Canada’s election and leading his Liberal Party to another term in power. Following a campaign dominated by Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats, Carney promised to chart “a new path forward” in a world “fundamentally changed” by a US that is newly hostile to free trade. “We are over the shock of the American betrayal, but we should never forget the lessons,” said Carney, who led the central banks of Canada and the UK before entering politics earlier this year. “We will win this trade war and
Armed with 4,000 eggs and a truckload of sugar and cream, French pastry chefs on Wednesday completed a 121.8m-long strawberry cake that they have claimed is the world’s longest ever made. Youssef El Gatou brought together 20 chefs to make the 1.2 tonne masterpiece that took a week to complete and was set out on tables in an ice rink in the Paris suburb town of Argenteuil for residents to inspect. The effort overtook a 100.48m-long strawberry cake made in the Italian town of San Mauro Torinese in 2019. El Gatou’s cake also used 350kg of strawberries, 150kg of sugar and 415kg of
RSS