The introduction in April of the health insurance system for people age 75 or over is exerting so much financial pressure on health insurance societies that some of them have dissolved themselves. As the graying of the population progresses, the government must reconstruct and set the nation's medical services system on a sound financial base.

Health insurance societies that mainly insure employees of large companies and their families, and those intended for employees of small companies, public servants and their families are now required to offer "support money" to fund the medical costs of people age 65 and over. Half of the cost of the new health insurance system is funded by tax money, 40 percent by this support money and the rest by premiums from program participants.

It is estimated that annual support money now amounts to ¥2.61 trillion, some ¥390 billion more than in the past. Most of the increase goes to help people age 65 through 74. This has forced many health insurance societies to raise their premiums. And some have concluded it is no longer profitable to keep operating. Since last April, about a dozen health insurance societies have dissolved themselves and joined a health insurance system for small-company employees and their families that used to be administered by the Social Insurance Agency but since Oct. 1 is being run by the National Health Insurance Association, a public corporation. This system is called Kyokai Kenpo.