Medical Care for the Atomic Bomb Victims in the United States
Profound physical, emotional and financial hardships characterize the socially neglected lives of....survivors of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bomb catastrophes living in the United States no less than similar hibakusha in Japan. These victims, principally US citizens of Japanese ancestry who were studying or working in Japan when World War II began, and postwar brides of US servicemen, have long been engaged in a tenacious struggle to obtain adequate medical care.
Until recently, the poorly understood maladies of these A-bomb survivors were considered idiosyncratic even in advanced non-military medical circles of North America. The Japanese term hibakusha, literally "A-bomb received person," is now entering general use to designate all victims of nuclear radiation. The serious nuclear reactor accident at the Three Mile Island power station, and the medical claims of U.S. servicemen and civilians exposed to radiation at the Defense Department's nuclear weapons testing sites have led many others to realize that they are also hibakusha. The need for sophisticated knowledge about radiation exposure, and the treatment of radiation-related illness, is now more urgent than ever.
The Hiroshima and Nagasaki victims residing in the US are a special group among the nearly 370,000 survivors of the August 1945 onslaughts who have been medically registered as A-bomb sufferers by the Ministry of Health and Welfare of Japan. Since they were strong enough to break their roots and emigrate, their number automatically excludes the grossly injured and sufferers of acute radiation diseases. Their daily lives are for the most part manageable, but as the hibakusha reach their middle and later years, they report greater susceptibility to disease, and a slower recovery rate from illness. They vividly recall the monstrous injuries, deaths and lingering radiation poisoning of the A-bomb shocks. They find their terrible pains for the most part undiagnosed by the medical profession, and cannot avoid attributing their complaints to the holocaust. Any symptom, to the hibakusha, is a possible sign of premature death, and their worries are heightened by apprehension that their children and grandchildren may suffer serious health deficiencies and physical deformities.
And yet, if the hibakusha openly reveal their tragic histories and distressing psychic trauma, insurance companies may cancel or raise the cost of their health coverage, or amend policies to exclude infirmities resulting from the atomic bombings.
An Exclusion' Clause in many Blue Cross Plan health insurance contracts disallows claims resulting from "war injury," which would encompass the many radiation and other A-bomb afflictions in the hibakusha of 1945. (Moreover, Blue Cross corporations specifically absolve themselves of claims resulting from "atomic explosion or other release of nuclear energy" occurring after the effective date of the insurance agreement. This would bar insurance protection against future radiation release from nuclear misfortunes such as Three Mile Island.) The extent to which anemia or more serious blood diseases, such as leukemia, which debilitate the hibakusha are insurable with Blue Cross is unclear. Needy hibakusha subscribers may also find it difficult to obtain, through Blue Cross, Medicare and Medical insurance policies, the preventative medicine services they require.
Owing to the frustrating, decades-long inability of the survivors to obtain medical services in the US, the "Committee of Atomic Bomb Survivors in the United States of America," centered in Los Angeles and San Francisco, has invited two specialized medical teams from Japan to conduct examinations and lay the basis for future treatment. In March-April 1977, a mission from the Hiroshima Prefectural Medical Association and the Radiation Effects Research Foundation (formerly the Atomic Bomb Casualty Commission), Hiroshima, was assisted by the Los Angeles County Medical Association and the Japanese-American Medical Association in examining 100 of the survivors in California. The Hiroshima physicians, through comprehensive medical examinations and screening by a survey and questionnaire, found that hypertension occurred in about 27 percent of the females and 10 percent of the males, that the incidence of female gynecologic surgery appeared high, and that a significant number of the hibakusha had low white blood cell counts. According to Dr. Thomas Noguchi, Los Angeles County Medical Examiner-Coroner, and one of the US physicians best informed on hibakusha symptomatology, the weakened blood formation systems of the hibakusha have led to a high degree of nutritional anemia, and there appears in addition to be a greater incidence of breast and uterine cancer than among the general female population.
(The herein above article, "Medical Care for the Atomic Bomb Victims in the United States" from the Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars, Vol. 12, 1980 - and see "On the hibakusha in Japan", see the Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars. Volume 10. No. 2, April-June, 1978 , pp. 28-37 presented in compliance withe the Fair Use Doctrine for educational and discussion purposes.)
Stephen Salaff
Until recently, the poorly understood maladies of these A-bomb survivors were considered idiosyncratic even in advanced non-military medical circles of North America. The Japanese term hibakusha, literally "A-bomb received person," is now entering general use to designate all victims of nuclear radiation. The serious nuclear reactor accident at the Three Mile Island power station, and the medical claims of U.S. servicemen and civilians exposed to radiation at the Defense Department's nuclear weapons testing sites have led many others to realize that they are also hibakusha. The need for sophisticated knowledge about radiation exposure, and the treatment of radiation-related illness, is now more urgent than ever.
The Hiroshima and Nagasaki victims residing in the US are a special group among the nearly 370,000 survivors of the August 1945 onslaughts who have been medically registered as A-bomb sufferers by the Ministry of Health and Welfare of Japan. Since they were strong enough to break their roots and emigrate, their number automatically excludes the grossly injured and sufferers of acute radiation diseases. Their daily lives are for the most part manageable, but as the hibakusha reach their middle and later years, they report greater susceptibility to disease, and a slower recovery rate from illness. They vividly recall the monstrous injuries, deaths and lingering radiation poisoning of the A-bomb shocks. They find their terrible pains for the most part undiagnosed by the medical profession, and cannot avoid attributing their complaints to the holocaust. Any symptom, to the hibakusha, is a possible sign of premature death, and their worries are heightened by apprehension that their children and grandchildren may suffer serious health deficiencies and physical deformities.
And yet, if the hibakusha openly reveal their tragic histories and distressing psychic trauma, insurance companies may cancel or raise the cost of their health coverage, or amend policies to exclude infirmities resulting from the atomic bombings.
An Exclusion' Clause in many Blue Cross Plan health insurance contracts disallows claims resulting from "war injury," which would encompass the many radiation and other A-bomb afflictions in the hibakusha of 1945. (Moreover, Blue Cross corporations specifically absolve themselves of claims resulting from "atomic explosion or other release of nuclear energy" occurring after the effective date of the insurance agreement. This would bar insurance protection against future radiation release from nuclear misfortunes such as Three Mile Island.) The extent to which anemia or more serious blood diseases, such as leukemia, which debilitate the hibakusha are insurable with Blue Cross is unclear. Needy hibakusha subscribers may also find it difficult to obtain, through Blue Cross, Medicare and Medical insurance policies, the preventative medicine services they require.
Owing to the frustrating, decades-long inability of the survivors to obtain medical services in the US, the "Committee of Atomic Bomb Survivors in the United States of America," centered in Los Angeles and San Francisco, has invited two specialized medical teams from Japan to conduct examinations and lay the basis for future treatment. In March-April 1977, a mission from the Hiroshima Prefectural Medical Association and the Radiation Effects Research Foundation (formerly the Atomic Bomb Casualty Commission), Hiroshima, was assisted by the Los Angeles County Medical Association and the Japanese-American Medical Association in examining 100 of the survivors in California. The Hiroshima physicians, through comprehensive medical examinations and screening by a survey and questionnaire, found that hypertension occurred in about 27 percent of the females and 10 percent of the males, that the incidence of female gynecologic surgery appeared high, and that a significant number of the hibakusha had low white blood cell counts. According to Dr. Thomas Noguchi, Los Angeles County Medical Examiner-Coroner, and one of the US physicians best informed on hibakusha symptomatology, the weakened blood formation systems of the hibakusha have led to a high degree of nutritional anemia, and there appears in addition to be a greater incidence of breast and uterine cancer than among the general female population.
(The herein above article, "Medical Care for the Atomic Bomb Victims in the United States" from the Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars, Vol. 12, 1980 - and see "On the hibakusha in Japan", see the Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars. Volume 10. No. 2, April-June, 1978 , pp. 28-37 presented in compliance withe the Fair Use Doctrine for educational and discussion purposes.)
Stephen Salaff
posted by R7 | 8/25/2004 03:53:00 PM
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