Posted on 01/23/2013 4:24:14 PM PST by Morgana
TOKYO, January 23, 2013 (LifeSiteNews.com) – The recently-elected government of Japan has made itself heard on the life issues. Finance minister Taro Aso, said on Monday that elderly and financially dependent Japanese have a duty to die quickly to take pressure off the government-funded social service system.
“Heaven forbid if you are forced to live on when you want to die,” Aso said. He described elderly people in need of care as “tube people” and complained that it costs “several tens of millions of yen” a month to care for a patient in the final stages of life.
Aso, who is 72, said he would refuse extensive government-funded care: “I would wake up feeling increasingly bad knowing that [treatment] was all being paid for by the government,” he told a meeting of the national council on social security reforms.
“The problem won't be solved unless you let them hurry up and die,” he said.
The comments highlight a growing hostility towards the elderly and vulnerable in Japan where an aging population has put unprecedented pressure on government-funded services. One quarter of the 128 million population is aged over 60 in Japan, which has had a birth rate well below replacement for some years.
The government is doing little to address a pending crisis in Japanese culture that has embraced western doctrines of population control. The median age for men in Japan is 44.1 years and for women is 46.9 years, well past the age of childbearing. The statistics for 2012 show an overall fertility rate of 1.39 children born per woman, a level described by some statisticians as the lowest-low, the “death spiral,” from which it is nearly impossible for a society to recover.
Taso has since partially apologized for his remarks, saying they may have been "inappropriate." He said he “wasn’t commenting on how terminal medical care should be,” but rather was expressing his "personal opinion."
Shame on you Aso San!
Wait until you get a load of our politicans when boomers overwhelm the system! Leftist diversity commentators are already insulting and disparaging “OLD WHITE PEOPLE.” Hopefully, they are going to learn about the third rail of politics but old boomers might get tricked by AARP and other liberal organization that traditionally represented their interests.
AARP promoted Obamacare knowing there would be death panels for the elderly and cuts to Medicare. AARP has not said a word about Obama giving people a ‘tax break’ by not having them pay into social security and medicare right when the those programs are underfunded.
He should change his name to Aho. (For you non-Japanese speakers, the meaning is very close to what it sounds like)
If the Japanese government is willing to pave their country in concrete,I am sure they can spare some cash to meet the promises to the old and aging.
The Demographics in this country are ugly,not because people live to be old but because people have no children.It is a grey childless nation,instituting a “please die” policy is disgusting.Banning abortion on the other hand,would help Japanese society.
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