Japan Press Weekly

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2012 August 22 - 28 [POLITICS]

Move of children’s hospital to soft-ground artificial island should be cancelled: JCP

Japanese Communist Party House of Councilors member Yamashita Yoshiki on August 20 at a House Oversight of Administration Committee meeting took up the planned relocation of a Hyogo prefectural children’s hospital to a man-made island vulnerable to quakes.

The Hyogo prefectural government plans to relocate the Hyogo Prefectural Kobe Children’s Hospital to Port Island, an artificial island in Kobe Port in Kobe City. However, all local healthcare organizations, including the Hyogo Prefectural Medical Association, oppose the plan.

Yamashita cited a report released by Kobe City Medical Center General Hospital which is located at Port Island. In the report, the hospital stated that at the time of the 1995 Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake, it was impossible to play a sufficient role as the key hospital in the city due to the suspension of the water supply and the closing of all traffic to the island.

Yamashita also pointed out that heads of the Hyogo Prefectural Society of Obstetrics and Gynecology and the Hyogo Pediatric Association jointly released a protest statement which points out that the relocation of the children’s hospital would lead to the collapse of emergency care for children and perinatal women inside the prefecture if a major disaster occurs.

He said, “The Kobe Children’s Hospital needs to play a central role in a time of disaster. The prefecture shouldn’t transfer the hospital to the man-made island at high risk of disaster.”