(JAPAN) Temporary housing sites to get nursing care bases

[AsahinaKimi]

The Yomiuri Shimbun

The welfare ministry revealed plans Tuesday to establish bases for nursing and child care for disaster victims at more than 100 temporary housing sites in nine prefectures affected by the March 11 earthquake, tsunami and ensuing nuclear crisis.

The Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry said it hopes to prevent people forced by the disaster to live in temporary housing from dying alone or becoming bedridden. The ministry was to notify the nine prefectural governments about the plan Tuesday.

The planned bases for elderly nursing care and child care will be managed by local privately run social welfare corporations or semiprivate social welfare councils. This would be the first time for the state to establish bases for nursing care to be managed by private entities at sites of temporary housing for people affected by a major natural disaster.

The nine prefectures are Aomori, Iwate, Miyagi, Fukushima, Ibaraki, Tochigi, Chiba, Niigata and Nagano.

The government plans to earmark 7 billion yen in its first supplementary budget for fiscal 2011 for the facilities, with the three most seriously affected prefectures of Iwate, Miyagi and Fukushima to get the bulk of the funds, or between 1 billion yen and 1.5 billion yen each.

According to the welfare ministry, the Disaster Relief Law allows for the establishment of a common meeting place at temporary housing sites with more than 50 units. By furnishing such meeting places with toilet, bathing and kitchen facilities for nursing care, it would provide a place to gather not only for the elderly but also for the physically challenged and adults with small children.

http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/national/T110419004801.htm