{"id":8527,"date":"2018-01-27T22:00:13","date_gmt":"2018-01-28T06:00:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.consciencelaws.org\/?p=8527"},"modified":"2018-07-08T22:03:46","modified_gmt":"2018-07-09T05:03:46","slug":"first-compensation-claim-for-compulsory-sterilisation-in-japan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.consciencelaws.org\/?p=8527","title":{"rendered":"First compensation claim for compulsory sterilisation in Japan"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.bioedge.org\/bioethics\/first-compensation-claim-for-compulsory-sterilisation-in-japan\/12578?\"><em><strong>BioEdge<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"author\">Michael Cook<\/p>\n<p>A Japanese woman in her 60s is planning to sue the government over her forced sterilization under a 1948 law. This will be the first time that state compensation has been sought for sterilisation. The mentally disabled woman in Miyagi Prefecture was a teenager when she was forced to undergo the procedure.<\/p>\n<p>Records of 2,700 people who were sterilized under the Eugenic Protection Law \u2014 which was in force until 1996 \u2014 have been found in local government archives, a development which could help victims seek state compensation.<\/p>\n<p>Like some Western countries, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.lit.osaka-cu.ac.jp\/user\/tsuchiya\/gyoseki\/paper\/JPN_Eugenics.html\"> Japan has a dark eugenic past<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>A 1948 Eugenic Protection Law (EPL) was intended to prevent the births of &#8220;inferior descendants&#8221; and to foster the health of mothers and pregnant women. It provided for both voluntary and involuntary sterilisation. Doctors could apply for permission for sterilisation to a regional board if a patient suffered from a range of conditions which were believe to be hereditary, including schizophrenia, manic-depressive psychosis, epilepsy, abnormal sexual desire, &#8220;remarkable criminal inclination,&#8221; Huntington&#8217;s disease, muscular dystrophy, albinism, achromatopsia, deafness, haemophilia,\u00a0and so on.<\/p>\n<p>The Ministry of Health issued guidelines in 1953 clarifying what doctors could do: &#8220;It is permissible to restrain the patient&#8217;s body, to administer an anesthetic, or to deceive the patient, etc.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>According to government statistics, between 1949 to 1994, 16,520 involuntary sterilizations were performed, 11,356 on women, and 5,164 on men. Most were performed on inmates of psychiatric hospitals and institutions for intellectually disabled people.<\/p>\n<p>Compulsory sterilisation lapsed in 1996 with the passage of the Mother&#8217;s Body Protection Law. However, the Japanese government has refused to apologize to the victims of the law or offer them compensation.<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-8343 alignleft\" src=\"http:\/\/consciencelaws.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/common.jpg\" alt=\"First compensation claim for compulsory sterilisation in Japan\" width=\"110\" height=\"39\" \/>This article is published by Michael Cook and BioEdge under a Creative Commons licence. You may republish it or translate it free of charge with attribution for non-commercial purposes following <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bioedge.org\/index.php\/bioethics\/copyright_and_syndication\"> these guidelines<\/a>. If you teach at a university we ask that your department make a donation to BioEdge. Commercial media must <a href=\"mailto:michael@bioedge.org\">contact BioEdge<\/a> for permission and fees. Some articles on this site are published under different terms.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>BioEdge Michael Cook A Japanese woman in her 60s is planning to sue the government over her forced sterilization under a 1948 law. This will be the first time that state compensation has been sought for sterilisation. The mentally disabled woman in Miyagi Prefecture was a teenager when she was forced to undergo the procedure. &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/news.consciencelaws.org\/?p=8527\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;First compensation claim for compulsory sterilisation in Japan&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5432,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,3699,409,9,334],"tags":[3465],"post_folder":[],"class_list":["post-8527","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ethics","category-eugenics-genetics","category-japan","category-news","category-sterilization","tag-miyagi-prefecture"],"yoast_head":"\r\n<title>First compensation claim for compulsory sterilisation in Japan - Protection of Conscience Project News<\/title>\r\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\r\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/news.consciencelaws.org\/?p=8527\" \/>\r\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\r\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\r\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"First compensation claim for compulsory sterilisation in Japan - Protection of Conscience Project News\" \/>\r\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"BioEdge Michael Cook A Japanese woman in her 60s is planning to sue the government over her forced sterilization under a 1948 law. This will be the first time that state compensation has been sought for sterilisation. 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