Tokiwadaira, one of Japan’s largest residential areas, is taking measures to combat lonely deaths, as many of its residents are elderly and live alone.
“My neighbors and I occasionally greet each other, but that’s it. If one of my neighbors passed away, I probably wouldn’t know,” Noriko Shikama, 76 years old, lives alone in an apartment in Tokiwadaira. , a suburb of Tokyo, said at the Iki Iki community support center.
She comes to the center to chat with other seniors, where they and volunteers discuss topics such as whether to dye their hair black or, more recently, reports of koritsushi (deaths in solitude), which are “deaths that no one knows about and whose bodies are found after a certain period of time.”
Japanese police in May released data on koritsushi, recording that nearly 22,000 people died at home without anyone knowing in the first three months of the year, nearly 80% of whom were over 65 years old. Based on this data, Japan may record up to 68,000 koritsushi cases a year.
A few days ago, authorities discovered the body of a woman who died five months ago in an apartment in Tokiwadaira.
“The smell was terrible, haunting me for life,” Ms. Shikana recalled.
A wheelchair outside an apartment building in the Tokiwadaira area of Tokyo. Photo: Guardian
When people first moved to Tokiwadaira 60 years ago, the four-story apartment buildings here were considered the dream homes of young Japanese families during Japan’s postwar economic miracle.
Back then, the neighborhood was filled with the laughter of children playing under the shade of the trees. Six decades later, Tokiwadaira has 170 apartment buildings, making it one of the largest residential areas in the country, but 54% of residents are over 64, and 1,000 of the 7,000 residents live alone.
“This place used to be very vibrant, but now everyone is old,” said Aiko Oshima, vice president of the Tokiwadaira residents’ association, who moved to the neighborhood in 1961.
As Japan struggles to control its aging population, more and more people are spending their final years alone. Japan currently has more than 7 million people over 65 years old living alone, expected to increase to nearly 11 million people by 2050.
According to the 2020 census, the number of one-person households accounts for 38% of all Japanese households, an increase of 13.3% compared to 5 years ago. “Koritsushi will definitely increase from now on, solving this problem is a prerequisite task,” Health Minister Keizo Takemi said.
Tokiwadaira first documented Koritsushi cases two decades ago, when authorities discovered the body of a man who had been dead for three years in his apartment.
His rent and bills were paid automatically, and people only discovered it when his savings were depleted. “It was unimaginable that anyone lived in that apartment,” Ms. Oshima said.
One of 170 four-story apartment buildings in the Tokiwadaira area, on the outskirts of Tokyo. Photo: Guardian
The series of Koritsushi cases spurred residents in the neighborhood to take action. The local residents’ association set up a hotline so neighbors could quickly notify authorities. In 2004, the association launched a “no lonely deaths” campaign, which became a model for other older housing complexes.
This year, Tokiwadaira introduced its kizuna monitoring device, equipped with sensors that detect movement in apartments. Volunteer teams also patrol regularly, looking for signs of trouble, such as clothes left on the balcony for too long, a full mailbox, or lights that stay on all the time.
Vice President Oshima said these campaigns have not completely eliminated Koritsushi cases. The neighborhood still sees a few cases each year, but it is rare for the deaths to have occurred weeks, months or years ago.
Outside the Iki Iki center, volunteers hang posters encouraging people to get outside and meet their neighbors, as well as charts showing the health benefits of regular walking.
Volunteers checked the apartment of Yoko Kohama, who has lived alone since her husband died eight years ago. Her dog of 18 years also died last year.
The 87-year-old, who once ran a mahjong parlor and a clothing store in Tokyo, now spends her days using a tablet and making umeboshi. She only goes out to play mahjong once a week, during which smoking, drinking, and gambling are prohibited.
“I have chronic lung disease and am not very well. I have a modest pension. I don’t know many people in this area,” said Kohama, who has no children. “I would be lying if I said I wasn’t worried about dying alone. But we can’t choose when and how, it’s all up to God.”