Environment Minister Meets Minamata Patients Groups on 69th Anniversary of 1st Official Recognition of Sufferer

The Yomiuri Shimbun

17:14 JST, May 1, 2025

MINAMATA, Kumamoto — As Thursday marked the 69th year since the first official recognition of Minamata disease, Environment Minister Keiichiro Asao met Thursday morning with an association of undiagnosed patients of the disease and another sufferers group in Minamata, Kumamoto Prefecture.

Shigemitsu Matsuzaki, 83, the deputy head of the association, demanded the correction of disparities in compensation and support between patients diagnosed with the disease and undiagnosed patients.

“The symptoms are the same for the patients who have been diagnosed with the disease and those who have not,” said Matsuzaki, whose wife, Etsuko, suffered from symptoms particular to Minamata disease but died without being recognized as a patient.

On May 1 last year, Matsuzaki took part in a meeting between groups of Minamata disease sufferers and then Environment Minister Shintaro Ito in Minamata. During that meeting, a ministry official switched off the microphones and interrupted Matsuzaki’s remarks about his wife, claiming that he had spoken longer than his group’s allotted time of three minutes.

The ministry was criticized for what happened, and Ito later made another visit to Minamata and apologized to Matsuzaki.

Because of the incident, the ministry arranged for Asao to visit Minamata on Wednesday to allow him to have enough time to meet sufferers groups.

At the meeting on Thursday, the two groups made some demands to the ministry. They included improving care and welfare support measures for undiagnosed patients, which are said to be insufficient compared to such measures for officially recognized patients.

“I will listen to their needs and continue exchanging opinions with those concerned,” Asao said, but he did not speak about details of actual measures for rectifying the problems.