In another example of vital statistics being grossly distorted by a combination of poor record keeping and possibly people with a selfish agenda, it is being reported in the Guardian and elsewhere that possibly hundreds of thousands of people over age 100 in Japan are actually dead, but unreported. Investigations are now underway to determine how much of this problem is due to record keeping problems and how much to family members failing to report the deaths of their elderly relatives in order to continue to collect their pension benefits by fraudulent means.
There are more than 77,000 Japanese citizens reported to be over age 120, and even 884 persons AGED OVER 150 YEARS OF AGE, who are still alive according to government rolls.
While we in the US wouldn’t bat an eye if we heard this story coming out of the Chicago area of Cook County, Illinois, given the number of dead people still actively voting in elections there, there are at least 230,000 people in Japan over age 100 who simply cannot be located by any means. This large centenarian population is largely responsible for the very high average life expectancy in Japan (currently listed by the World Bank as 82.6 years, more than four years greater than the US average of 78.4 years (this is including dead voters in Chicago)), as well as any senior citizens under 100 who are actually dead but have not been reported as such on government records.
NOTE: Even if persons over 100 aren’t counted in life expectancy statistics, as is claimed later in the article, the problem doesn’t just begin at age 100, it is clear that whatever problems are at the root of these errors, they extend to a large number of people below age 100 who are also dead but are listed as alive on government records.
This distortion in Japan’s real average life expectancy is a great example of how a large body of statistics can be spoiled by poor record keeping or outright fraud.
Where this becomes problematic for us in the US is that Japan’s high life expectancy has been repeatedly used by the left as “facts” to support their demands for universal health care as well as various changes in the dietary, smoking, and exercise habits of Americans, frequently associated with proposals for large amounts of government regulation and taxation of the lives of private citizens and regulation and banning of various legal products (soda pop, breakfast cereals, beef, etc). We should look on the exposure of this statistical error as an object lesson we can apply to other public policy issues that so-called scientists attempt to promote ‘solutions’ to problems that they claim exist, based on faulty facts.
Obviously global warming is good for increasing life expectancy, at least is Japan.
I am amazed at there being more than one person posting here who believes that all counted in a census of any country are required to “present” themselves to be counted.
Can they have possibly have participated in the very recent US census? To whom did they present themselves?
They as as likely to present in the town square and and be counted by the mayor personally in those little villages such as London, Berlin and Moscow or perhaps New York City. Could it be completed on the morning coffee break?
Once again I find myself an unbeliever.
“RockyRoad says:
September 13, 2010 at 10:47 am
Sorry, Phillip, if by “divisory” you mean you want some comments struck because they have political overtones, I don’t agree. If the person says something stupid, let it be recognized as such, but if he exposes a truth, let it be heard. If the person says something that’s not Politically Correct by your definition, that’s just tough. Nothing should be censored unless it is completely off topic, at which point they can put it in the correct post (or request such a post be started). Start controlling comments and I’m outta here. (Also why I never visit RealClimate (an oxymoron, of course).)”
I do not want any comments struck. This was a post given the honour of appearing on the WUWT board; a post that made a politically divisory conclusion from a false premise. ‘the left’ s embarrassment was invented. The author set up a straw man and catapulted off into an analogy between the tobacco lobby and the climate skepticism. It is all based on a false premise, as anyone with rudimentary maths can discover, so can easily be picked apart by WUWT-hating bloggers or Guardian readers (the original story is from the Guardian so their readers may well find themselves directed here). I can see the headlines now; worse still if it appears that WUWT commenters appear to be anti-healthcare.
Sun Tzu could have written a volumes about the interweb.
You are right about the census. I didn’t send in my “fill in the blanks and just send it in” form (including filling in the dependent section: yes my aunt is still living with me at the amazing age of 210 years old and she is my dependent). So I had a census worker come to my door. Because I am a single woman, I met with the person on my front porch. I could have been harboring any number of dead or alive persons in my house and the census worker would not have known.
I also prefer that Anthony use a rather light hand at posts, but a stronger hand with comments. People’s organized, original, posted articles should see the light of day and let them live or fall by the comments. And people’s comments should be done with civility and manners. I don’t care to sup with pigs but topics fairly presented should be subjected to mannered scrutiny.
GeoFlynx says:
September 13, 2010 at 10:26 am
“Those “so called” scientists with their “cigarettes and too much sugar is bad for you,” just might be telling us something that benefits us all.”
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I think you are the first person to bring up smoking in this discussion. Apparently, you are under the impression that Japanese don’t smoke as much as others. Wrong. http://www.japanprobe.com/2010/07/04/smoking-in-japan/ Not sure about the Cocoa Puffs, but either way you look at it, some conventional beliefs are in conflict and if we really want to honestly understand which are correct assumptions and which are not, you’d have to be willing to confront some of the assertions “scientists” make. It is something I like to call “critical thinking”.
JDN, If they’re using the median, then you have to remove that 3% and go that far down the median line. Actually, half that amount, and see what that number is.
So the new median life expectancy would be the previous 48.5% number. Perhaps there is some cheating that is caught below the median line as well.
Mod, I’m not sure why this happens, but I think my post went to the black hole again. If anyone can give me some insight as to why this occurs, I’d be happy to try and correct it from this end. Thanks.
[Rescued & posted. WordPress knows why posts end up in the Spam folder, but they don’t reveal their algorithm. We don’t always know why, unless it’s because they contain too many links. ~dbs, mod.]
What I personally don’t care for in the article is the leap to conclusions based on incomplete information. Isn’t the careful analysis of available data what this website is all about? I’m no fan of American national healthcare or Japanese national healthcare (and I lived in Japan for about 7 years), but the quick smear based on having read one news article is the anthesis of what I expect here.
Now to the question before us:
Japanese government computer databases identifying individuals are riddled with problems. Here’s an abstract of one article about that subject by Professor of Economics, Institute of Economic Research, Hitotsubashi University:
http://www.ier.hit-u.ac.jp/pie/stage2/English/report/PR0906/3.1%20takayama.pdf
Essentially the problem boils down to the difficulty encountered some decades back when attempting to computerize complex kanji character names from paper records.
Quote from the article Since there are variations in the correct pronunciation of Japanese names consisting of the same Chinese characters, it was necessary to ask each individual to verify the correct pronunciation of their name.
However, the correct pronunciations of the names were not asked in processing punch cards, mainly due to budget limitations. Card punchers were forced to mechanically assign one pronunciation of each Chinese character, correct or wrong. Mistakes made in the process of transferring the records from the old format to the new one remained long uncorrected.
Thus many of the statistics regarding the older population whose records were transcribed into digital form in the 1960’s are suspect.
I make no claims about how this fact will affect the average age of the population, but introduce the fact to aid those who wish to make a proper analysis rather than assuming that the world is going to boil over.
Think they won the war….as they sent Suzuki to invade cable channels 🙂
E’s not dead…..E’s just resting…..
Philip Thomas says:
September 13, 2010 at 11:14 am
“….a post that made a politically divisory conclusion from a false premise. ‘the left’ s embarrassment was invented…..”
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So, the constant comparisons of the U.S. longevity to (pick a nation), tied to regulation and taxation in the form of outlawed foods, taxed tobacco, forced insurance purchase(guised as punishing the evil insurance companies, go figure), ect. is not coming from the left? The left’s embarrassment is, indeed, invented, but by the left itself.
As Pamela has shown, defining the left is fairly subjective, so, when I speak of the left, I frame it in the context of what I believe the left is and perhaps not what you view it as.
It’s simply amazing to me to see so many people skeptical of climate science but none of the other outrageous assertions that have been made in the past by activists.
The fine (but rather gruesome) art of Sokushinbutsu or just plain fraud by Sogen Kato’s caring family? Wich includes his wife who died at the age 101 in 2004. Or did she (O_o)?
Our Anime Festival (www.animecon.nl) in 2011 has the “Undead” as theme called “The childeren of the night” since it is our 13th edition, and the undead are alive and well in Japan, but it gets a whole new meaning in this way 🙂
Regarding extreme age, may I draw your attention to the website
http://www.grg.org and specifically their tables –
http://www.grg.org/Adams/Tables.htm
This website, which appears to me to be more authoritative than Guinness [certainly now Guinness has gone all media-driven] allows only one undisputed 120th birthday – Jeanne Calment, a Frenchwoman who passed 122.
Interestingly, there are only eight undisputed Japanese in the top 50 ‘supercentenarians’ [those confirmed and validated as over 110 years old] of all time. Two other Japanese claims – both in the top ten – but disputed. Also five Brits, and eighteen who were born in the US [and at least a couple of immigrants].
Probably statistically insignifcant, and partly an artefact of early record-keeping, I know, but possibly interesting.
It looks like my post also ended up in a black hole, i try again.
The fine (but rather gruesome) art of Sokushinbutsu or just plain fraud by Sogen Kato’s caring family? Wich includes his wife who died at the age 101 in 2004. Or did she (O_o)?
Our Anime Festival (www . animecon . nl) in 2011 has the “Undead” as theme called “The childeren of the night” since it is our 13th edition, and the undead are alive and well in Japan, but it gets a whole new meaning in this way 🙂
lOKKI says:
September 13, 2010 at 11:42 am
“I’m no fan of American national healthcare or Japanese national healthcare (and I lived in Japan for about 7 years), but the quick smear based on having read one news article is the anthesis of what I expect here.”
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I’m not sure what was “smeared”, but I read the article as a call to actually look at the numbers and confront some conventionally held views. Which, is exactly what I’ve come to expect here.
Defining the right is equally subjective and I have been guilty of stereotypical statements regarding that party. A read of their platform statements, along with the stuff written in-between the lines, puts me in my place with a rather tanned hide. Painting with a wide brush is always a crude portrayal of complicated issues.
“GeoFlynx – Yeah, those darn scientists and all their so called facts. Mike, did you ever consider that a steady diet of Marlborough’s and Coco Puffs just might be raising health care costs for everyone. The right to sell and consume proven unhealthy products should be linked with the consequences, not only on the individual, but to the society as a whole. Freedom to sell “snake oil” as medicine should be no more guaranteed than the freedom to sell “sugar” to children as food. Those “so called” scientists with their “cigarettes and too much sugar is bad for you,” just might be telling us something that benefits us all.”
The only reason that people’s individual behaviors and choices can inflict large societal costs and hence be used to to justify greatly enhanced monitoring, hectoring, and regulation by exponentially burgeoning governmental organizations is because the false notion that people have a “right” to expect others to bear the cost of those bad choices has been systematically ingrained in the population. In the the last half century we have moved from a point where most people covered as much of their personal healthcare costs out-of -pocket as was provided by others to where in the not distant future more than 90% of those costs will be on someone else’s dime.
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_otfwl2zc6Qc/TIwqZM_SzZI/AAAAAAAAOYE/b4-U69svxsY/s1600/medcosts.jpg
Not surprisingly, that era was also marked by healthcare costs rising at a large multiple of the core inflation rate. The current”Big Solution” of expanding the subsidy that people expect to receive while hoping that we can control the soaring costs by getting everyone to just do as our”scientifically” guided overlords demand is so incredibly ignorant that only someone who has spent their life cocooned away from reality within a bubble of Socialist delusion would even consider it. Unfortunately our politicians, like all good dope pushers, know they have their junkies hooked. Only a small minority of the population even remember when being a leech on the backside of your fellow man was considered a humiliation, not a God given “right”. Most have been convinced that they couldn’t possibly survive without the kindly munificence of the political class.
It’s quite sad, because if the populous could ever be convinced to look at the healthcare system rationally again, there are relatively simple and provenly effective measures ( high deductible catastrophic insurance plans combined with HSAs, loser pays tort reform, interstate availability of insurance plans, etc.) which while they can’t make the system perfect, would transform it from a looming”crisis” to the chronic PITA it was formerly. If we really want adequate and affordable healthcare, we’d be much better served by getting the politicians entirely out of it and turning it over to the guys running WalMart.
Winston Churchchill once quite correctly remarked . There are lies , outright lies and then there is statistics . Presently it is looking that the US government and its institutions are acting in full agreement with his words . Statistics are generally used to get the favoured message across to the general public . If the message is no longer supported by the statistics then it is time to get the message across another way , or are we denials totally mistaken ? Be prepared , my very passionate concerned scientists and pseudo-scientists , it may get very chilly in the warmers-church within short ………
awww, vapid left-baiting smears, a proud tradition of the “right” blogosphere. God knows no one on the “right” has ever manipulated statistics for their own ideological agenda. If your intention with this article is to preach to the choir, then mission accomplished.
Their seems to be a widely held view on this thread that: smoking is bad for you, that soda pop and boxed cereals won’t do you much harm. Hmm.
Many statistical frauds have been been committed over many years and such is my interest. I come to this site daily because of that particular interest. IMO there have been three gigantic frauds over the last sixty years which have impinged on the lives of every one of us. The poor state of temperature records and the way these have been abused by statistical means is the third of the three and that case is not yet lost. Why fructose will certainly kill you in the long run is in a slightly different class and I will not go into that here.
If you believe that smoking will kill you the reason for your belief is that the late Professor Sir Richard Doll said so. (He got the knighthood for his service to medicine). That was his hypothesis and he proceeded to ‘prove’ it by statistical means. His data collection comprised of questionnaires compiled by physicians and related only to their own smoking habits, or lack of them. In climate science we might compare this with collecting temperature data by asking a few thousand climatologists around the world to report twice a year on what they thought about the weather. Smoking may indeed be bad for one but the sloppy methods of Professor Doll will never tell us.
The other major statistical fraud was that of the late Professor Ancel Keys. He was the fellow who persuaded you, with deliberately false statistics, that you should avoid saturated fats. As with smoking, there is not one tittle of scientific evidence that animal fats in moderation will harm you. If you believe otherwise, then you have been misled by false statistical manipulation. There were skeptics in both of these cases, and some eminent people amongst them. Sadly, we had no internet, no blogs, no WUWT.
I wonder how many dead weather stations are still reporting. For example, the Delaware OH USHCN station hasn’t had a daily reading since Jan 2001, but was still cranking out monthly averages demonstrating warming through 2006 when I checked the USHCN2 figures. This may still be going on, though I haven’t figured out how to unzip UCHCN3 yet.
Perhaps Japan’s vital statistics office “homogenizes” individual records the way NCDC does weather stations, so that an individual is considered to be alive if enough neighbors are still living!
“John Hayte says:
September 13, 2010 at 12:58 pm
awww, vapid left-baiting smears, a proud tradition of the “right” blogosphere. God knows no one on the “right” has ever manipulated statistics for their own ideological agenda. If your intention with this article is to preach to the choir, then mission accomplished.”
I knew would happen because of this article. ‘vapid left-baiting smears’ – he is absolutely right; the smears were baseless! Somebody decided to air the article and it has given THEM ammunition. It is almost as if somebody wanted this to happen.
max ( September 13, 2010 at 10:30 am )
“…the post-vital lifestyle.”
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I like that expression, but I suspect that the PC term is “vitality-challenged.”
Let us not descend into vitalism, prejudice in favor of the live and against the vitality-challenged.
frederik wisse says:
September 13, 2010 at 12:57 pm
You are right: Since science research was replaced by statistics…it happened with it the same as to politicians.