We All Live Inside the “Boundary” of Fukushima

Since the disaster in March 2011, Fukushima University has carried out its Fukushima Ambassador Program (FAP) twice yearly, for two weeks each, providing foreign exchange students with opportunities to visit affected areas in Fukushima Prefecture. Through homestays, the students are supposed to see the actual conditions in the area and how people are coping.

Sae Ochi, M.D., M.P.H., Ph.D. Lecturer, Department of Laboratory Medicine, The Jikei University School of Medicine Attending Physician, Soma Central Hospital The first FAP took place in May 2012, a little more than a year after the earthquake, tsunamis and accident happened in March 2011, and a time when even many Japanese were reluctant to enter the region. “During the first program,” said William McMichael, “a pair of gloves painted red was sent from the U.S. to the university president with the message, ‘Are you trying to kill our students? Their blood will be on your hands.’” Despite that, McMichael—a Japanese-Canadian who serves as FAP’s sponsor—has never ceased working to act as a “bridge” between other countries and Fukushima, traveling abroad and steadily carrying out pub...more

26 September, 2017

Responsibility for Explaining the Unknowable

"The situation at the Fukushima Nuclear Power Station is so serious!"
"People are sick because of radioactivity."

Sae Ochi, M.D., M.P.H., Ph.D. Lecturer, Department of Laboratory Medicine, The Jikei University School of Medicine Attending Physician, Soma Central Hospital On September 15, those were the top two articles from a Google Japan search in Japanese for "Fukushima" plus "radioactivity." Objective data, including a map of radioactivity distributions, was third. I cannot but feel that unfounded fears and rumors about Fukushima remain firmly rooted. And speaking out against them—about the calm recognition of facts and correct knowledge—is not enough to eliminate the vague sense of terror associated with Fukushima. That is what we have learned over the past seven years. No matter how they are explained, and no matter how easy they are to understand, ‘facts’ cannot always be conveyed. Tha...more
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