PHOTO EXHIBITION |
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| ASBESTOS HAZARD IN YOKOSUKA: CITY WITH A NAVAL BASE AND SHIPYARD |
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"WE LIVE. WE ARE ANGRY.
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| Sponsored By Yokosuka Pneumoconiosis Hazard Victims' Group Pneumoconiosis Victims' Association Yokosuka Branch Kanagawa Occupational Safety and Health Center Pneumoconiosis and Asbestos Victims' Relief Fund |
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| AKIRA IMAI: The Photographer And His Profile  Born in 1953. Motivated in the latter half of 1970s through editing a magazine for labour campaigns, he started to take documentary photos of labour campaigns. Having taken photos of various civil campaigns like anti-nuclear weapons protests, anti-reactors protests, anti-U.S.Base protests and so on, he wishes to go on taking photos of ordinary people to keep their dignity in record as one of gordinary people.h |
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| This photo exhibit is to record the people
who have worked at the U.S.Naval Base or Sumitomo Heavy Industries Co. Ltd., spotlighting on how they live now. Pneumoconiosis and asbestos hazard is a dark shadow that came with the development of Yokosuka. The disease victims have lived so quietly as to refrain from coughing in public. Japan started importing asbestos in the 1890s and has now become one of the largest consuming / importing countries in the world. During World War II, asbestos imports were stopped and the government promoted developing domestic asbestos mines (about fifty mines). None of those mining sites are in operation at present, except Furano, Hokkaido where only a small amount of asbestos from slagheaps is processed into fibers. Almost all asbestos used in Japan has been imported. The Labour Standard Law (enacted in 1947), The Pneumoconiosis Law (enacted in 1960) and the Industrial Safety and Health Law (enacted in 1972) had dealt with asbestos regulations at the workplace in view of preventing asbestosis (as a part of pneumoconiosis). In 1975, The Ordinance of Prevention of Hazards due to Specified Chemical Substances (enacted in 1971) was revised, and with this amendment asbestos was legally acknowledged as a carcinogen (classified as "specified group-2 substance" and spraying asbestos was prophibited. (The spraying of rockwool containing less than 50% asbestos coninued until 1979.) In 1978, The Ministry of Labour (now The Ministly of Health, Labour and Welfare) set up The Recognition Standards for Worker's Compensation of Asbestos-Related Disease (Asbestosis, Lung Cancer and Mesothelioma). The relief activities for asbestos victims in Yokosuka started from the exclusive story carried on the front page of the YOMIURI newspaper of May 8, 1982. A survey by Dr. Miura and his medical team of the Yokosuka Kyosai Hospital revealed that one-third of 39 patients who died of lung cancer in past 5 years were due to asbestos and they were mainly Naval and Shipyard workers. Having been shocked by the news, Kanagawa Occupational Safety and Health Center (KOSHC), All Japan Shipbuilding and Engeneering Union (SEU) Oppama/Uraga Branch have carried out "voluntary collective medical examinations" for former Naval and Shipyard workers since 1984. This has led KOSHC to give support to victims found through these examinations by helping them collect compensation. Kanagawa Worker's Medical Cooperative has opened the Yokosuka Central Clinic which has offered medical examinations as well as treatments for the victims. In 1986, when a big repair job of the aircraft carrier MIDWAY was carried out at the U.S. Navy Yokosuka Base, a large amount of asbestos waste was produced and illegally disposed of, which was disclosed by KOSHC. This incident sparked off mass removal of sprayed asbestos in school buildings and raised a big social concern, known as the "School Panic" during 1987-88, as well as the awareness of the asbestos issue among Japanese people. In 1988, eight former shipyard workers with asbestosis and in 1995, a bereaved family of a former shipyard worker who died of asbestos-related lung cancer sued their employer, the Sumitomo Heavy Indusries Co. Ltd.. Both cases were settled in 1997, with the company admitting its responsibility. At the same time SEU Oppama/Uraga Branch reached an agreement with the company for pneumoconiosis (Secondary/Extra) compensation applying to all retired workers. In the same year, all the groups and the teams which had been supporting the cases decided to continue their activities, so they established the Pneumoconiosis and Asbestos Victims Relief Fund. The organization opens a "Pneumoconiosis and Asbestos Hazard Hotline" every July as one of its activities, trying to uncover pneumoconiosis and asbestos victims who have not yet been discovered and helped. Through the consultation service, they've come to work on the compensation claims for the retired U.S. Naval Base workers. In 1998, 12 former U.S. Naval Shipyard Repairing Facility's workers and four bereaved families in Yokosuka sued the central government on the basis of a law concerning the U.S.-Japan Security Treaty. This case is now under litigation. As you can see from the above, this photo exhibition has been carried out by many people in Yokosuka who've been working together. And we must not forget about those shipbuilding workers who have already passsed away without being compensated for their suffering from asbestos hazard. We extend our gratitude to those medical people and to our fellow members and supporters who have made strenuous efforts so that the asbestos hazard might be officially compensated. It would be our great pleasure if this photo exhibit helps the message of elminating asbestos hazard to reach out from Yokosuka towards 21st century. |
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