Medicines available in the US and Europe that Japanese patients cannot get. We unpack Japan's drug loss problem: the count falling from 86 to 78, a new fiscal-2026 budget, and the fresh risk posed by Trump's drug-pricing executive order.
Ibaraki has become the first prefecture in Japan to pay residents a cash reward for reporting illegal foreign employment. Inside the design, the governor's defense, the backlash from lawyers, and the farming-economy contradiction underneath it all.
An unpermitted mosque facing removal in Japan exposes the real problem: the issue isn't faith, it's the permit — and the lawful route to building one is often blocked. A look at Japan's rising Muslim population, its population decline, and the legal path that was never built.
Japan's 2025 census preliminary count puts the population at 123 million, down 3.1 million in five years — the steepest drop since records began. The country fell from 11th to 12th in the world, overtaken by Ethiopia. We translate that number into cities you can picture, then compare how South Korea, Italy, and China face the same cliff, and ask whether Japan's immigration, birth-support, and regional-revival policies are working.
In 2021 a turtle halted a turtle-painted jet at Narita Airport. Behind the viral story lies a four-year campaign against an invasive American reptile.
Kawasaki Heavy Industries has begun pitching a technology that produces naphtha—the building block of plastics—from hydrogen instead of crude oil. Built on its commercial gas-to-gasoline plant in Turkmenistan, the proposal lands in the middle of a Japanese petrochemical crisis triggered by the Strait of Hormuz disruption.
Japan's Environment Ministry confirmed PFAS contamination above national limits at 629 sites across 26 prefectures in fiscal 2024 — including locations near U.S. military bases, factories, and Self-Defense Force facilities. A UN special rapporteur has voiced 'most serious concern,' while Japan's standards lag far behind those of the U.S. and EU.
Researchers at Kyoto University used Japan's near-total medical insurance database to trace esotropia (inward-turning eyes) cases from 2014 to 2019, the years smartphones swept the country. Incidence rose from 32.26 to 36.61 per 100,000 person-years; surgeries climbed from 3,061 to 3,743. The link with smartphone penetration is strong, the absolute rise is small.
Calbee is switching 14 of its flagship snacks — including Potato Chips Lightly Salted, Consomme Punch, and Kappa Ebisen shrimp chips — to monochrome 'petroleum-saving packages' from May 25. The cause: ink shortages triggered by the Hormuz Strait crisis. A symbolic case of geopolitical risk reaching Japan's shelves, compared with parallel moves at Lindt, Lamb Weston and Smithfield Foods.
MAGES. has officially announced no streaming or let's plays will be permitted for STEINS;GATE RE:BOOT, launching August 20, 2026. Console share features are restricted to private use only. What Western streamers and visual novel fans need to know — including the 2023 case where Japan's first arrest over a game stream was for a Steins;Gate game.
On May 8, 2026, the US Department of War launched war.gov/UFO and released 162 UAP files in one go—including a football-shaped object filmed near Japan by Indo-Pacific Command in January 2023, Apollo 12 and 17 lunar surface photos, and orange orbs agents compared to the 'Eye of Sauron'. We break down what is actually in the release and how Japan is reacting, from yakisoba puns to distraction-theory skepticism.