Yangsan-si, Intensive Management of High-Risk Groups for Solitary Deaths During Lunar New Year Holiday

Yangsan City in Gyeongnam Province will conduct prevention and intensive management for high-risk groups of solitary deaths from the 20th, when the Lunar New Year holiday begins, until the 30th of this month, when the holiday ends.

Yangsan City Safe App Project Information.

As the number of solitary death candidates continues to increase due to reasons such as unemployment, divorce, and illness, and especially rises before and after the holiday period, the city has designated an intensive management period ahead of the Lunar New Year holiday.

First, from the 20th, a pre-discovery period for high-risk solitary death groups (20th?24th) will be designated. Customized welfare teams in each eup, myeon, and dong will operate dedicated reporting desks, and human safety nets such as village honorary social welfare officers will be utilized to intensively discover isolated (reclusive) households living cut off from society, as well as young carers in family care and other at-risk households.

During the Lunar New Year holiday period, 24-hour continuous monitoring of high-risk solitary death groups will be conducted using ICT.

First, the Smart Care Plug system detects electricity usage and illumination levels to confirm safety and prevent solitary deaths. When a risk situation is detected for the subject, the crisis is immediately verified and emergency relief is provided to save lives. Last year, many lives were saved from solitary deaths and safety accidents through this system.

Smart Care Plug Project Information.

Since the second half of last year, companion robots have been installed and supported for high-risk groups, enabling continuous two-way communication for solitary death management. These companion robots can also detect crisis situations 24 hours a day and connect to the control center for immediate emergency response when a crisis is detected.

The city plans to actively promote the use of the ‘Safety App,’ a system that detects smartphone usage within a certain time to confirm safety and sends alert messages to registered contacts if a crisis is detected. The Safety App can be freely installed by any citizen using a smartphone (Android users) and used by entering family or acquaintance contact information.

A Yangsan City official stated, “Lunar New Year is the biggest holiday in Korea where families and relatives gather to feel warm family affection, but for those isolated from society and spending time alone, it is an especially lonely and difficult period. We ask for interest and warmth toward neighbors around us so that Yangsan can become a welfare city without social isolation, and the city will do its best as well.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.