TOKYO – More than half of those killed by Japan’s massive quake-tsunami were elderly, a report said Sunday.
Of the nearly 8,000 dead whose ages are known, around 4,400 were aged 65 or older, the Asahi Shimbun said, citing police figures.
Fishing villages and small communities along the country’s northeast coast were badly hit by the March 11 tsunami that roared ashore after a 9.0 magnitude undersea quake struck in the middle of the afternoon.
Those aged 65 or over make up around a quarter of the population of fast-greying Japan, where a declining birthrate is adding to demographic woes.
The figure is slightly higher in rural communities whose young people, citing work opportunities and lifestyle choices, have for many years been decamping to the cities.
The paper said the elderly in tsunami-hit areas could have been disproportionately affected because of their lack of mobility.
“Many people are believed to have lost their lives (in the tsunami) because they were physically not able to leave (or) because there was no one to assist them,” the paper said.
At the time the tsunami struck many children were in schools, which are often built on higher ground or designed to be used as places of refuge in times of disaster.
Around 13,000 people are known to have died in the double disaster, with a further 15,000 still officially listed as missing.
The paper said the number of dead and missing is likely to rise because the towering waves killed entire families, leaving no one to report their fate to authorities.