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Elderly isolated at homeBy:
Kazuhiro Nozawa Over one in 10 elderly people have no one to help them in an emergency, an employees' union survey has found. The Japan Federation of Public Service Employees' Unions' survey found that 12 percent of aged people have no one who could come to their aid in the event of an emergency. The number of people who rarely had contact with others in their neighborhoods reached 39.8 percent, the results showed. The survey, conducted on 4,000 households whose members were aged 65 or older in cooperation with staff from Meiji Gakuin University's Department of Sociology and Social Work, found that many individuals and couples are isolated. Of elderly people surveyed, 14.1 percent were living alone. A total of 26.8 percent of the households were couples. By area, 53.1 percent of the elderly households in city suburbs consisted of either individuals or couples. For depopulated areas, the figure was 46.3 percent, while the percentage of those living alone in major cities was 40.8 percent. Loneliness dominates many aged person's lives, the survey shows. A total of 6.5 percent of pollees said they usually had no contact with other humans. A huge 24.4 percent said they had no friends. Also highlighted in the survey was the tight financial situation of elderly people. Public pensions were the sole source of income for close to two-thirds of households -- 62 percent. Just over 35 percent survived on less than 100,000 yen a month. Although almost nine out of 10 pollees knew about national nursing care insurance, about 20 to 30 percent were unaware that nursing services were charged for. About 14 percent are receiving limited services because they couldn't pay associated fees needed for more extensive care. Of these, more than 60 percent lived on incomes of under 100,000 yen a month. "It has become clear that low-income groups are being left out in the cold when it comes to nursing insurance," said Meiji Gakuin University Professor Katsuyoshi Kawai of the results, adding that a second survey on home helpers and caring facility managers is under way.
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