When Japanese news outlets reported the problems with software like Microsoft Teams, they used the term “障害”, and since the same term is often used to refer to a news story about disability issues, it was difficult to find news about people with disabilities in Japan, as any Google search with the term “障害”only returned results to do with the Microsoft 365 outage.
The Mitsubishi Electric Advanced Technology Research Institute in Japan is researching remote control technology on the theme of no-contact. This initiative is being undertaken so that people with physical disabilities can perform jobs and find work.
The Japanese government plans to launch a system by the end of fiscal 2022 to have over 20,000 personnel help elderly people with their smartphones and other digital devices, it was learned Wednesday.
An experiment is being carried out in Tsukuba City, Ibaraki Prefecture, to demonstrate a service that would allow users to use a single app to make cab reservations and arrange for vehicles to be automatically driven around hospitals so that elderly people and people with disabilities who have difficulty getting around can visit medical institutions smoothly.
Hyogo Prefecture has become the first prefecture in Japan to use a new guidance system for the blind and visually impaired whereby the colour of traffic lights can be detected via a smartphone.
On July 8, an attempt to use virtual reality (VR) in training for people with developmental or cognitive disabilities to find employment or return to work was held at ‘Work Support Suginami’, an employment transition support office in Tokyo’s Suginami Ward.
In April, the app “shikAI” that supports the movement of visually impaired people about 200 meters between the exit of Tokyo Metro Higashi-Ikebukuro Station (Higashi-Ikebukuro 4) and the ward office (Minami-Ikebukuro 2) “started to provide voice route guidance.”
The so-called “digital disability certificate”, which is equipped with information on the disability certificate on smartphones, became available for use on JR and private railways nationwide from the 13th.
A Japanese government institution has developed a smartphone app designed to prevent elderly people from developing dementia amid restraints on going out and other activities away from home due to the novel coronavirus outbreak.
“Mohammad Pashai, an Iranian resident of Japan who became paralyzed from the waist down after an accident at work, is expanding the horizons of his disabled compatriots back home by sending them secondhand wheelchairs and other assistive devices.”
Barrier Free Japan