Japan’s Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications to introduce “telephone relay” system for emergency calls for the hearing impaired in 2021

Translated and edited from The Mainichi Shimbun

November 26th 2019

TOKYO- Japan’s Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications has made it a policy for emergency calls such as 110 and 119 regarding the “telephone relay service” for the hearing impaired, which is scheduled to be implemented nationwide from 2021. The conventional, privately-owned service does not accept emergency calls in principle, but the system will be improved to meet the need of the deaf and hearing impaired.