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More than 30 hepatitis B patients and their lawyers on December 8 visited Japanese Communist Party Chair Shii Kazuo at the JCP head office to ask for support in their court struggles to achieve a complete settlement by the year-end. In lawsuits that 613 plaintiffs have filed with ten district courts across Japan, they are demanding compensation for health damage caused by being infected with the hepatitis B virus through inappropriate handling of needles at the time of compulsory vaccinations. Taniguchi Mieko, on behalf of all the plaintiffs, handed Shii a written request calling on the JCP, together with other parties, to urge the government to reach a basic agreement to relieve all the plaintiffs within this year. Consultations toward a settlement mediated by courts have been continuing at the Sapporo and Fukuoka district courts since July, but the government is attempting to unjustly limit the coverage and standards for compensation so that many plaintiffs will be denied coverage. The government is trying to end the case by refusing to approve the asymptomatic carriers right to claim compensation. This is the biggest obstacle to negotiating a settlement. Sato Tetsuyuki, a representative of the lawyers’ bench, said that the government is responsible for concealing the fact that the group vaccination was the cause of infection and neglecting to take counter-measures for 40 years. Shii said that he respects the plaintiffs’ decision to stand firm on the principle of neither giving up a single plaintiff nor allowing any discrimination among them, and promised to make the utmost efforts to help them. |
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