Yet the Japanese make such an effort to emphasize the mysterious and surely paranormal likelihood of any mountain hiker that goes missing.
Ive seen more than one show and read a number of articles about the missing but no one ever mentions bears in Japan outside of ancient Ainu bear cult references as though the bears disappeared along with oni and sea dragons.
I started looking, and was surprised I did not find any central database for people killed by bears in Japan. From a few news articles, the number of people killed by bears in Japan sometimes surpasses the number killed by bears in North America.