The population of Kaisei Town in January 2017 is 17,273, and the percentage of population aged 65 and over is 24%. This percentage is estimated to be 24.7% in 2025, which means one in four people will be elderly (65 and over). As the population of Kaisei Town ages, services for the elderly will continue to increase.
From this perspective, Kaisei Town set seven items as its basic goals starting from “enhancement of life supporting measures” and is providing various services, based on the basic philosophy “Creating a lifelong healthy and welfare town where people can live a healthy and lively life in their own way” in the framework of the town’s Elderly People’s Health and Welfare Plan.
For the elderly to live in the place they have lived, it is important to provide home medical care and nursing care in a comprehensive manner. With this in mind, we established the Consulting Center for Coordination of Home Medical Care and Nursing Care, through cooperation among one city and five towns in the Ashigarakami District and with the support of local medical associations.
In the Western Area of Kanagawa Prefecture where Kaisei Town is located, the municipalities have a close relationship historically and geographically. Kanagawa Prefectural Government positioned this area as a “strategic area for improvement of ME-BYO” and has promoted projects to revitalize this area in order to extend healthy life expectancy of the people living in and visiting to the area.
In order to make Kaisei Town more age-friendly, we will join the projects collaborating with Kanagawa Prefectural Government and other municipalities in this area and aim to be “the healthiest, the most energetic and cleanest town in Japan.” We will listen to the needs of the elderly, the opinions of citizens and experts, and reflect them on our policies. Also, by linking with the comprehensive plan of Kaisei Town, we will implement age-friendly projects in various fields of our administration.
(ME-BYO: Rather than regarding health and illness as being mutually exclusive, the concept of ME-BYO views a person’s mental and physical condition as continuously changing along a spectrum between health and illness).