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Births Up, Suicides Down in 2006: Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare

June 6, 2007
By Ken Worsley


The first bit of news should not surprise us so much: The Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare announced today that Japan’s birth rate had increased from 1.26 in 2006 to 1.32 in 2006. This is the first increase in six years, and the ministry attributes the rise in the country’s birth rate partly to Japan’s economic recovery, which has apparently encouraged more people to get married and have babies.

This is what I’ve been saying all along: No secure future, no kids. Although the ministry declined to say that this is a turnaround in the declining birthrate trend, we have to be on guard for such claims from policymakers who still seem to espouse the attitude that the problem will take care of itself with little or no reform in workplace cultures.

1,092,662 babies were born in Japan in 2006, up 2.8 percent from a year earlier.

And, for the first time in four years, the number of suicides fell below 30,000, at 29,887. The National Police Agency releases more detailed suicide statistics (including the numbers of suspected and suspicious cases), though those won’t be out for a few days or so.

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Comments

3 Responses to “Births Up, Suicides Down in 2006: Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare”

  1. John S on June 7th, 2007 3:39 am

    This still leaves the projected population decline in place, I’m assuming.

    And, with the number of suicides, come on…are these books cooked? It seems as though they were desperate to get the number under 30,000. But how desperate?

  2. Vimy on June 7th, 2007 1:52 pm

    The suicide data needs some clarification. According to The Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare’s data, the number of suicides is down, but according to the The National Police Agency’s data, which is considered more accurate, the number of suicides still tops 30,000 even though it has fallen a bit.

    See:
    http://mdn.mainichi-msn.co.jp/national/news/20070607p2a00m0na004000c.html

    and

    http://asia.news.yahoo.com/070607/kyodo/d8pjn43o0.html

    FWIW

  3. Ken Worsley on June 7th, 2007 7:48 pm

    Vimy, yup - that’s what I said at the end of the post: the NPA releases much more comprehensive data on suicides.
    They number the ’suspicious’ and ’suspected’ cases as well. I’ll try to get a better look at both up here. I
    I did see that the NPA data was released today, but haven’t actually had the time to see it yet.

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