Postal Workers Strengthen Welfare Network... Hadong County Launches 'Welfare Letter Service'

Regular Visits and Case Management for Socially Isolated Households
in Cooperation with the Post Office

Hadong County in South Gyeongsang Province announced on the 16th that it is implementing a "Welfare Letter Service" targeting single-person households who are socially isolated and households at risk of solitary death.

The Welfare Letter Service was launched after being selected for the Ministry of the Interior and Safety's 2026 Township Smart Welfare Safety Service Improvement Model Development Project. The service will be operated for 100 households in the region until December of this year.

To promote the project, the county signed a business agreement with Hadong Post Office in March, and began providing the well-being check service through postal workers starting in April.

[Photo by Hadong County] Hadong County is confirming the well-being of residents by having post office mail carriers visit target households to deliver daily necessities as part of the welfare mailing service.

The postal workers visit the target households twice a month, delivering daily necessities and checking on their well-being. During the visits, they fill out a checklist that includes items such as health status, living environment, and hygiene conditions, and submit it to the county.

Based on the inspection results, Hadong County will share information on households showing signs of crisis with the relevant township offices and connect them with necessary welfare services through case management.

A county official stated, "Through regular visits by postal workers, we are able to check the living conditions of households at risk of isolation and connect them to needed welfare services. We plan to continue this project to discover and support those in welfare blind spots."

Solitary death and social isolation are challenges for the local community that are difficult to resolve through the efforts of administrative agencies alone. Hadong County's Welfare Letter Service is meaningful in that it utilizes postal workers, who have routine contact with residents, as a public-private cooperation model to detect early warning signs of crisis and connect households to welfare services.

However, the effectiveness of the service depends not just on regular visits, but on how quickly and continuously support and management are provided to households in crisis. Only when the system for identifying recipients and managing follow-up is established together can the policy be positioned as a way to reduce welfare blind spots.

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