June 3, 2020

With a heavy impact of the coronavirus pandemic, nearly 50% of welfare facilities, which provide services that help people with disabilities live independently, are facing income losses. This was shown in the survey results which the Japan Association of Community Workshops for Disabled Persons (Kyosaren) released recently.

Kyosaren in May surveyed the current financial situation of operators of welfare facilities for disabled persons. In the survey, 47.1% said that their income in April decreased compared with the same month of the previous year.

The percentages of facility operators who are experiencing income losses among operators of facilities providing short-stay services and facilities providing visiting support services were 87% and 80%, respectively. The largest decline was three million yen for short-stay service providers and 3.5 million yen for visiting support service providers.

In the free-response section, many respondents wrote comments stressing how severely they are affected by the corona crisis. An operator of a short-stay facility wrote, “Like mine, facilities providing short-stay daily-life assistance to disabled people are excluded from the government support being offered. I constantly feel I may be forced to close my facility.”

The major factor for income drops of welfare facilities for the disabled is a decrease in the number of users in association with the current pandemic as shown in another survey that Kyosaren conducted in April in this regard. In the survey, roughly 90% of facility operators surveyed said that their income decreased due to a fall in the number of users.

Kyosaren senior managing director Akamatsu Hidetomo pointed out, “It is imperative that the government provide support to all types of welfare facilities for the disabled for their survival during the ongoing health crisis.”

Past related article:
> Corona crisis directly hits short-handed social welfare entities [April 10, 2020]