Japan and Centenarians
Kanako Mita and Noriko Watanabe
Modern Tokyo Times
Japan’s demographic reality is becoming ever more stark. According to figures released by the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, the nation in 2025 counts a record 99,763 centenarians, a milestone that powerfully underscores the aging nature of Japanese society.
The BBC reports, “Setting a new record for the 55th year in a row, the number of centenarians in Japan was 99,763 as of September, the health ministry said on Friday. Of that total, women accounted for an overwhelming 88%.”
Each morning across the country, elderly citizens can be seen engaging in light exercises, stretching in public spaces, or setting out on brisk walks. Combined with disciplined dietary habits, healthy eating remains embedded in the everyday fabric of life—one of the key pillars behind Japan’s remarkable longevity.
Women account for an overwhelming 88 percent of centenarians, highlighting both biological longevity and long-standing social patterns. Regionally, the contrasts are striking. Shimane Prefecture records the highest proportion of centenarians at 159.5 per 100,000 people in 2024, while Saitama Prefecture remained at the bottom of the table in the same year with just 45.8 per 100,000.
NHK captures the speed of this transformation: “The ministry says there were 153 centenarians in 1963. The figure topped 1,000 in 1981 and first surpassed 10,000 in 1998.” What was once exceptional has become a defining feature of modern Japan.
Yet this triumph of longevity is unfolding alongside a profound demographic collapse. In the opposite direction to the soaring number of centenarians, Japan’s birth rate continues to fall sharply. Accordinly, in 2022, births dropped below 800,000, down dramatically from 1.5 million in the early 1980s—a decline that threatens the very foundations of economic and social continuity.
Former Prime Minister Fumio Kishida warned several years ago that Japan was “on the brink” due to the declining birth rate.
Whether the incumbent leader, Sanae Takaichi, can reverse this trajectory and lay the foundations for a society in which births rise meaningfully remains an open question. Should she fail—like many previous leaders of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP)—Japan may drift, quietly and incrementally, toward a mass-immigration model implemented by stealth, rather than through open national consensus.
The World Economic Forum, assessing Japan’s aging society in 2023, delivered a blunt assessment: “This is a ticking time bomb for Japan’s social security system, which is struggling to meet the costs of a retired population with fewer workers paying taxes.”
Japan thus stands at a defining juncture—a nation that has mastered longevity, yet risks losing demographic balance, with consequences that will reverberate for generations to come.
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