How Japan lost 3 million people in five years

A seven-month-old baby and her mother look at early flowering Kanzakura cherry blossoms in full bloom at the Shinjuku Gyoen National Garden in Tokyo, Japan, on March 14, 2018. (File photo: Reuters)

TOKYO — Japan’s population fell by more than 3 million over the past five years, according to official statistics released Friday, a drop that underscores the depths of the country’s accelerating demographic crisis.

The population stood at 123 million last year, according to preliminary census results, down from 126.1 million in 2020. It is the biggest decrease since the government began collecting census data in 1920.