The number of emergency phone calls to police using the 110 service across Japan in 2005 is expected to register the first drop on record, the National Police Agency said Thursday. Records have been kept since 1961.
Police received 8.53 million calls from January to November, down 1.8 percent from the same period in 2004.
This means one out of 15 people made 110 calls during the period. A daily average of 110 calls stood at 26,000.
Although final figures have yet to be available, if December calls are added, the total is estimated to reach just over 9.3 million, down from a record 9.54 million calls handled in 2004.
The NPA laid the decline partly to reinforced patrols to prevent purse-snatching.
The largest proportion of calls, at 30.7 percent, were made to report traffic accidents, parking violations and other vehicle-related incidents.
The number of penal code-related calls, including break-ins, dropped to 624,000, down 66,000 from a year earlier.
Calls for inquiries about such things as renewing driver's licenses fell to 1.32 million, down 92,000 calls from the previous year.
The Metropolitan Police Department received 1.29 million calls, the largest number, while Shimane Prefecture had only 28,000 calls.
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