The Rafu Shimpo - L.A. Japanese Daily News

Hibakusha to Undergo Health Exams
By GWEN MURANAKA
RAFU ENGLISH EDITOR IN CHIEF
Sunday, July 1, 2007

Team arrives from Hiroshima for check ups of atomic bomb survivors.

GWEN MURANAKA/Rafu Shimpo
Physicians participating in this year’s medical examinations.

Atomic bomb survivors Junji Sarashina, left, and Kaz Suyeishi answer questions at a press conference announcing medical examinations for victims of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The exams will take place at Little Company of Mary Hospital in Torrance from June 30 to July 2.

A team of physicians from Hiroshima arrived this week to perform biannual check ups on victims of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. At a press conference Thursday at Little Company of Mary Hospital in Torrance, the team said it expects to examine more than 150 local residents who are hibakusha survivors.

“The Hiroshima Prefectural Medical Association (HPMA) has decided to continue the dispatch of medical teams for health examinations for the humanitarian reason that A-bomb survivors are A-bomb survivors, wherever they are,” said Dr. Shizuteru Usui, president of the Hiroshima Prefectural Medical Association.

It has been 30 years since the program started. This year the examinations will take place from July 30-July 2 at the Medical Institute Little Company of Mary CareStation Del Amo in Torrance. HPMA is being assisted in Los Angeles by the Japanese Community Health, Inc. and the Los Angeles County Medical Association. In Japan, the efforts are coordinated with the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare and Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Radiation Effects Research Foundation.

Doctors from JCHI assist the Japanese physicians who do not have licenses to practice medicine in California. The program also examines hibakusha in San Francisco, Seattle and Hawaii and has seen more than 5,000 people over the past 30 years. According to the Associated Press, about 260,000 people survived the attacks, including 4,000 now living abroad.

Dr. Fred Sakurai, JCHI president, said he feels a personal connection to the issue because of his brother, an atomic bomb survivor, who lives in Tokyo and has had three types of cancer.

“We’re very glad to be able to help atomic bomb survivors here,” Dr. Sakurai said.

The doctors asserted that the main goal of the examinations is to help the victims, who are now all elderly.

“The average age of A-bomb survivors is now 75 years,” noted Dr. Usui. “Worries about their health including cancer, cardiovascular disease and so on continue to increase.”

According to a report by the HPMA, there is a 20 percent incident rate of cancer among the hibakusha, including stomach cancer and breast cancer. Cancer and genetic defects are among the concerns expressed by the bombing survivors and their children, the hibaku Nisei.

Kaz Suyeishi, president of the American Society of Hiroshima-Nagasaki A-Bomb Survivors, recalled the difficulties she had as a survivor living in the U.S.

“In those days, not too many people know about hibakusha. Doctors didn’t have enough information about radiation, so when I have unusual illness, they said you are home sick, go home,” said Suyeishi.

She described Aug. 6, 1945 as a beautiful day and remembered watching the Enola Gay B-29 bomber as it dropped its lethal payload.

“Survivor is not only by looking. The scar is here,” Suyeishi said, pointing to her heart. “And that scar will never disappear until we die. We don’t want anybody else to experience that.”