Number of Hibakusha Drops to 91,100

Tokyo, July 1 (Jiji Press)–The number of hibakusha survivors of the 1945 U.S. atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki had fallen to 91,105 as of the end of March this year, Japan’s welfare ministry said Wednesday. The number of hibakusha with victim certificates declined by 8,025 from a year before, when the total stood below 100,000 for the first time, at 99,130, according to the ministry. The average age of hibakusha rose to 86.66 from 86.13. The latest total included 33,232 in the western Japan city of Hiroshima and 15,582 in the southwestern Japan city of Nagasaki. Hiroshima was devastated by a U.S. atomic bomb on Aug. 6, 1945, in the closing days of World War II. Nagasaki suffered the same fate three days later. Aside from Hiroshima and Nagasaki prefectures, Tokyo, the western prefecture of Osaka and the southwestern prefecture of Fukuoka had many hibakusha. The ministry has been announcing the number of living hibakusha as of the end of March every year since the issuance of the victim certificate started in 1957. The number peaked at 372,264 in 1981 and has been on a declining trend since then. The figure fell below 300,000 in 2000 and below 200,000 in 2014. The ministry sought testimonies from all living hibakusha for the first time in 30 years in 2025, when Japan marked the 80th anniversary of the atomic bombings. It will do so again this year. “Amid the aging of hibakusha, we want to increase opportunities to hear from them,” a ministry official said. END [Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]