Record 16,000 People With Dementia Went Missing Last Year in Japan

Data from Japan's National Police Agency estimated that a record 15,863 people with dementia were reported missing in 2017, according to the Japan Times . A total of 227 were still not located by the end of the year. The number of missing person reports rose to 431 from 2016 and represented a 65 percent rise from 2012, when comparable data became available. Local police have been working with municipal authorities to find wandering persons with dementia faster, and some debuted new methods such as the prior registration of the pattern of veins in an individual's palm and other information, as well as the compiling of databases of those with dementia for quick and accurate identification. About 14 percent of Japan's senior population are age 75 or older, and the number of seniors with dementia is expected to reach 7 million in 2025, according to a government calculation. Including those reported missing in earlier years, the locations of 10,129 people were discovered by the police in 2017, 5,037 came home by themselves or were found by their families, and 470 were found deceased. The poll indicated that 72.7 percent were found on the day their disappearance was reported to police. Some 99.3 percent were found within a week. The overall total who went missing last year, including those without dementia, was 84,850. Osaka was the prefecture with the most people with dementia reported missing last year at 1,801.