In Japan, 1 in 3 people over the age of 60 has no close friends

Source: Overseas Network

In Tokyo, Japan, the elderly celebrate the "Day of Respect for the Elderly" with wooden dumbbells. (Infographic)

According to Japan's "Asahi Shimbun" news, Japan's Cabinet Office released this year's "White Paper on Aging Society" on june 11, which mentioned that the elderly over 60 years old in Japan, about 1 in 3 people "have no close friends other than relatives." The Japanese government believes that the problem of loneliness among the elderly has become a serious social problem.

Since 1980, the Cabinet Office of Japan has conducted this survey every five years to ask questions about the living conditions of the elderly over the age of 60. The survey, conducted from December last year (2020) to January this year, collected responses from 1,367 people in Japan. For the question "Are there any close friends other than family members who can discuss or trouble each other", 31.3% of the total answers "no", an increase of 5.4 percentage points over 5 years ago. The statistics of this problem in the United States, Germany, and Sweden are all around 10%.

Now that the COVID-19 pandemic has spread and there are fewer opportunities for people to meet directly, the Japanese Cabinet Office is currently using the Internet to actively promote the participation of the elderly in regional activities, hoping that Japan's elderly people can get rid of unnecessary loneliness. (Overseas Network Wang Shanning)

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