TOKYO: The number of centenarians in Japan totaled 80,450 as of Tuesday, topping 80,000 for the first time ever, the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare said the same day.

The number of people aged 100 or over in the country was up by 9,176 from a year before and hit a record high for the 50th consecutive year, the ministry said in a report released ahead of the Respect for the Aged Day, which falls on Monday next week.

Of the centenarians, women numbered 70,975, accounting for 88.2 pct of the total.

The number of centenarians stood at only 153 in 1963, when the statistics began. The total exceeded 1,000 in 1981, 10,000 in 1998 and 50,000 in 2012.

Compared with the year-on-year growth in the number of centenarians that did not exceed around 4,000 in past years, the pace of increase accelerated this year possibly because an extraordinarily large number of babies were born in Japan in 1920, or 100 years ago, a health ministry official said.

There were 63.76 centenarians per 100,000 people nationwide as of Tuesday, the ministry said.

Among Japan’s 47 prefectures, Shimane logged the highest centenarian rate per 100,000 for the eighth straight year, at 127.60, followed by Kochi with 119.77 and Tottori with 109.89.

By contrast, Saitama was at the bottom of the list for 31 years in a row, at 40.01. Aichi was second from the bottom at 41.79, and Chiba third, at 45.98.

Japan’s oldest woman is Kane Tanaka, a 117-year-old resident of the southwestern city of Fukuoka, who is recognized by the Guinness World Records as the world’s oldest living person.

The oldest man in the country is Mikizo Ueda, 110, a resident of the city of Nara, western Japan.

The number of people who turn 100 by the end of the current fiscal year through next March stands at 41,802, the ministry said.

Japan gives silver cups and congratulatory certificates to new centenarians.

JIJI Press