An increasing number of people are absorbed so much in playing games, chatting and surfing online that the habit is causing them problems in their daily lives. Internet addiction should be viewed as a social problem involving both children and adults. Families, educators and the central and local governments should take measures to combat the problem, including education, advice and counseling for people who have developed Internet addictions.
For the first time ever, a panel of the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry has carried out surveys covering nearly 100,000 junior high and senior high school students and found out that 8.1 percent of them were addicted to the Internet. The panel distributed questionnaires to some 140,000 students through junior high and senior high schools in Tokyo, Hokkaido and Japan's 45 prefectures from October 2012 to March 2013 and about 98,000 students responded. If the 8.1 percent figure is applied to the total number of students in junior and senior high schools, an estimated 518,000 of them are Internet addicts. This number should be taken seriously.
The National Hospital Organization's Kurihama Medical and Addiction Center in Kanagawa Prefecture carried out surveys in 2008 and estimated that some 2.71 million adults are Internet addicts. This number is growing as computers become increasingly portable. In July 2011, the center opened a special section to deal with Internet addiction and since then some 400 people have contacted the center and more than 150 received treatment.