The official death toll from the Japanese earthquake and tsunami on March 11 has now reached 10,000, but the number of missing people has been reported as 17,500, with little hope of finding any of the missing alive.

The Fukushima nuclear power plant is still emitting radioactive vapour as workers keep spraying water on the overheating reactors. The plant’s operator Tokyo Electric is estimating it could take another month to cool the reactors to enable them to be shut down.

A total of 177,500 people have been evacuated from the 20km exclusion zone around the damaged plant, and it is possible the exclusion zone may be widened by another 10km.

The Japanese Government has estimated the losses from the earthquake and tsunami at between ¥16 billion and ¥25 billion ($197 billion to $308.5 billion) making it the world’s most expensive disaster.

AIR Worldwide has issued a revised estimate of the cost to insurers from the earthquake and tsunami. It now believes the cost will be between ¥1.5 trillion to ¥2.5 trillion ($20 billion to $30 billion). The estimates exclude business interruption, motor vehicle, life insurance and infrastructure claims.

A total of 18,713 buildings have been destroyed and 107,117 have been damaged, according to the National Police Agency of Japan.