Disability News Japan

A 37-year-old employee at a prefectural support facility for people with disabilities in Atsugi City, Kanagawa Prefecture, was arrested on suspicion of assaulting a male user, causing serious injuries that left his leg cracked. According to the police, at around 2:20 p.m. on November 2nd, a 29-year-old male user was pushed to the ground in the hallway of the facility, causing serious injuries that...

The Japanese Supreme Court’s First Petty Bench decided Wednesday to have the top court’s Grand Bench issue a unified ruling on five damages lawsuits filed by forced sterilization victims under the now-defunct eugenic protection law.  The lawsuits were initially filed with district courts in Sapporo, Sendai, Tokyo, Osaka and Kobe. All but Tokyo District Court found the old law unconstitutional, whi...

The first prison in the country to house only young inmates with physical disabilities or intellectual disabilities, with an emphasis on supporting their reintegration into society, was established in Ichihara City, Chiba Prefecture. Episode Notes: https://barrierfreejapan.com/2023/10/30/first-prison-in-japan-to-house-only-young-inmates-with-developmental-and-other-disabilities-opens/

The movie “Moon,” modelled on the Sagamihara Massacre has opened nationwide in Japan and on Sunday 29th October 2023, I watched it. Here are my initial thoughts, recorded almost right after watching the movie. Apologies for the sound quality, I just wanted to capture how the movie struck me. Episode notes: https://barrierfreejapan.com/2023/10/22/disabled-actors-star-in-sagamihara-massacre-inspired...

Five years in the making, Sony PlayStation is releasing a new highly adjustable video game controller for a wide variety of gamers with various physical disabilities. Playing video games has long been a challenge for people with disabilities, chiefly because the standard controllers for the PlayStation, Xbox or Nintendo can be difficult, or even impossible, to maneuver for people with limited mobi...

The film 'Moon' is set in a facility for the severely disabled, where the disabled are repeatedly subjected to heartless treatment and violence. The story depicts an employee with an irrationally amplified sense of justice and mission as he approaches the incident. In June of last year, the users of “AGALA” (Arita City, Wakayama Prefecture), a facility that supports the employment of people with d...

An interview with a person concerned revealed that a man in his 50s was seriously injured last month (September) at a facility for the disabled in Takatsuki City, Osaka, breaking his ribs. According to the facility, one of the former employees admitted to assaulting the man, and the city is now investigating the details. Three organizations representing people with disabilities in Aichi Prefecture...

Japan's Emperor Naruhito and Empress Masako on Sunday visited Ishikawa Prefecture to attend the opening ceremony of the National Cultural Festival and the National Arts and Culture Festival for Persons with Disabilities in Kanazawa, the prefecture's capital. Episode Notes: https://barrierfreejapan.com/2023/10/16/japan-emperor-empress-visit-ishikawa-pref-attends-national-arts-and-culture-festival-f...

Some issues and incidents regarding people with disabilities in Japan seem to keep re-appearing and re-occurring. They also often seem to keep happening in the same place. A lot of the recent cases of suspected abuse of people with disabilities seem to occur in Tsu City in Mie Prefecture, western Japan. The episodes notes for this podcast episode provides a brief timeline of the suspected abuse re...

According to the Japanese Government, 'Society 5.0' is a “human-centered society that achieves both economic development and the resolution of social issues through a system that highly integrates cyberspace (virtual space) and physical space (real space)." Episode Notes: 'Society 5.0': https://www8.cao.go.jp/cstp/society5_0/ The Robots Are Coming! (To Take Care of You, We Promise): https://barrie...

Tokyo’s Edogawa Ward is trialing a virtual ward office in the metaverse, aiming to offer administrative services for people unable to visit the real-life office. In the “metaverse ward office,” local residents can use their avatars to move around inside a virtual municipal hall, which is designed like the real one, after accessing the virtual space from the ward’s website. The ward aspires to make...

“Miss Keller met the press upon completion of her tour of Japan and gave her impressions of the work being done here for the blind and deaf. Just as the education of normal people in Japan depends on school boards represented by intelligent men and women alive to democracy and public ideals, so the blind and the deaf will receive the best assistance if the persons appointed to watch over their aff...

Two cases of abuse at a facility for persons with disabilities in Hodogaya-ku, Yokohama City, where staff members kicked users in the knees, have been recognized by the city as abuse of persons with disabilities, and the city has instructed the facilities to prevent recurrence. Episode Notes: https://barrierfreejapan.com/2023/10/05/yokohama-city-recognizes-two-cases-of-abuse-at-facilities-for-pers...

It was learned on October 1st that a 31-year-old woman with a mild intellectual disability living in a group home (GH) in Kanagawa Prefecture gave birth to a boy and wanted to raise him, but had no choice but to place him in an infant home. They were not accepted at GH, and it was difficult to receive sufficient childcare support outside of the GH. Episode Notes: https://barrierfreejapan.com/2023/...

The Mie Prefectural Support Center for the Deaf and Hearing Impaired, which provides support for the hearing impaired and trains sign language interpreters, announced that someone had gained unauthorized access to a staff member's computer, possibly leaking the names, addresses, and other personal information of about 1,200 people, including the hearing impaired and sign language interpreters, to...

I went to Tokyo for an academic conference, my first time going to Tokyo for over four years. I do approve of the work that is being done on JR Shibuya Station to make it more accessible, but I can appreciate that it can be an inconvenience to some people whilst the work is being carried out.

A jury trial began on September 20th at the Okayama District Court for a mother accused of strangling and killing her 8-year-old son, who was severely intellectually disabled, in Wake Town, Okayama Prefecture in June 2022. The mother admitted to the indictment, saying, "There is no doubt.” Episode Notes: https://barrierfreejapan.com/2023/09/20/there-was-no-one-i-could-talk-to-about-my-worries-moth...

A free app for people with disabilities and supporters seeking friendship in Japan has achieved 10,000 downloads in two months since its launch in July. As with other matching tools, users of the "Irodori" app register their own information, such as date of birth and gender, and it has a field to enter whether or not they have a disability. The app has communities where people with similar interes...

At the Kanagawa Prefectural Assembly on September 12, Governor Kuroiwa announced his intention to transfer three of the prefectural support facilities for people with disabilities to the private sector. Among the prefectural facilities, Nakai Yamayuri Garden will continue, and the future direction of Serigaya Yamayuri Garden and Tsukui Yamayuri Garden will be considered based on the operational st...

It was a chilling act, and one with an unusual motive. The death of the 79-year-old woman was not a mercy killing. The husband bore no ill-feelings toward her, nor did he feel overburdened by caring for her for about 40 years. Instead, he stubbornly felt that he, and he alone, should be the one tending to the needs of his beloved partner, even when he became too weak to do the job. Episode Notes:...

In terms of specific damage, there were cases where people were paid less than the local minimum wage, and cases where people suffered burns when a gas burner was pressed against their arms. Episode Notes: https://barrierfreejapan.com/2023/09/09/update-656-disabled-abused-in-the-workplace-in-fy2022/

Japan’s Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare announced on September 8th that in fiscal year 2022, a total of 656 people with disabilities were found to have been abused by their superiors or employers in the workplace, an increase of 30.7% from the previous year. Episode Notes https://barrierfreejapan.com/2023/09/08/656-people-with-disabilities-in-japan-were-abused-in-the-workplace-in-fy2022-30-i...

“At the World Expo 2025 (Osaka Kansai Expo), based on “Designing Future Society for Our Lives” theme and “Unity in diversity” venue design concept, we respect the values and individuality of each person, regardless of his/her nationality, culture, race, sex, generation, whether he/she has disabilities or not, etc., and aim to implement a universal design that is easy to use for people from all ove...

A man accused of carrying out a deadly arson attack on a Kyoto Animation Co. studio four years ago admitted the charges in the indictment, in the first hearing of his trial at Kyoto District Court on Tuesday. The defense said Aoba should be acquitted due to his mental incompetence or given leniency due to his diminished capacity. Episode Notes: ‘ “I now think that I went too far” Suspect in 2019 K...

Alpinist Yuichiro Miura, 90, reached the summit of Mount Fuji with a group of friends and family on Thursday, having used a wheelchair for the three-day ascent. With the theme of the “circle'' that connects people through the tournament, the design features a hand used in sign language and cherry blossom petals as motifs, and will be widely used in PR for the tournament. Episode Notes: ‘90-year-ol...