Don’t leave Asia’s ageing debate until it’s too late

Last month, Japan’s internal affairs ministry released its yearly data ahead of Respect for the Aged Day. People aged 65 and over now make up a record 29.6 per cent of the population. But the figure I keep coming back to was this: 9.43 million Japanese workers were 65 or older last year, about 13.8 per cent of everyone with a job.

The Asia-Pacific Regional Conference on Population Ageing is set to be held in Hangzhou, China, later this month. The organisers – HelpAge International, the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) and the China National Committee on Ageing – point out that ageing is reshaping labour markets and public finances across the region. But we also need to consider what happens to a family or a company when the person holding it together gets sick at 45.

I can answer that one. At 37, after building companies across three countries, I ended up in intensive care. That experience is why I now spend my working life on prevention.