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21 October 2025

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Dying alone becomes New Normal in Japan

Bloomberg Article - Dying Alone Becomes New Normal as Japan Spurns Confucius

Japan, with the world’s highest proportion of retirees, can’t build nursing homes fast enough. By 2025, one in three citizens will be 65 years or older from 12 percent of the population in 1990, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development estimates. A lack of long-term care facilities means seniors increasingly risk living alone in ill-equipped homes or suffering abuse in the care of resentful relatives.

Worldwide, the proportion of people older than 60 years in populations is increasing more than three times faster than the total growth rate. Within five years, adults 65 years and older will outnumber children younger than 5 for the first time. By 2050, there will be 2 billion people 60 years or older, from 605 million in 2000, the World Health Organization said.

  •   17 March 2013
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