Water Outages a Top Disaster Concern in Japan, But Many Unprepared

Premium Water, which provides a natural water delivery service, conducted a disaster prevention awareness survey for its subscribers. Asked what would concern them in the event of disaster, the two largest worries were “water outage” (82.2%) and “power outage” (80.2%).

The percentage of people who had prepared bōsai or disaster prevention supplies at home stood at 62.7%. The top three types were “flashlights” (91.7%), “emergency food and preserved food” (79.2%), and “drinking water” (78.0%).

When it came to what respondents felt was the most important to prepare, “drinking water” was by far and away top.

The national and local governments recommend that each adult should prepare three liters of water a day for at least three days—if possible, a week—for drinking and cooking.

When respondents were asked how much emergency water they had prepared, only 24.6% had the minimum recommended amount of nine liters per adult and, at 46.7%, almost half had not even prepared one day’s supply of three liters.

(Translated from Japanese. Banner photo © Pixta.)