Three days after the Hiroshima Day, this is the Nagasaki Day, 9 August. Millions have offered prayers at two minutes past eleven in the morning, when the bomb exploded. The list of those persons who have gone to the other world in the past one year contains 3,404 names, bringing the total of the dead because of this bomb to 162,083. The slogan of "let it be the last nuclear explosion" has been echoed by many.
As in Hiroshima, the Mayor of Nagasaki has read out his Declaration for Peace. And again as in the former, it has requested the Government to take some concrete and urgent steps at the UN and elsewhere to join forces with other peace-loving people and organizations. He has made specific reference to the desirability of the Nuclear-free Northeast Asia. On those points, the two Mayors are much more advanced than the Prime Minister, Mr.Abe Shinzo. He spoke next, but his speech was not to the point, lukewarm, non-responsive.
Let me summarize here a very valuable radio-activity related medical research which was broadcast by Japan's NHK for 75 minutes in the evening of 6 August, the Hiroshima Day.
The small damages of the chromosome by the radioactivity remained latent, so to speak, and suddenly leukemia develops from them about a decade after the injuries. Many hibakusha (explosion-affected people)passed away in this manner. The rate of leukemia was about 20 times more than the ordinary people. The nearer the patient to the point of explosion, the higher was the rate. The incidence declined after about 20 years of the explosion.
I would think that thus far the knowledge was more or less wide-spread. What seems to be new is the following, which belongs to a new area of research. Briefly the above is not the end of the story. And sadly it is not the end of the hibakusha's suffering, either.
It has been found out that, after about 40 years more, and this is after 68 years after the two Bombs, some of the hibakusha developed MDS (Myelodysplastic Syndromes). This is a disease in which the white cells get affected by cancer. This is known as the Second Leukemia, but the research tells us that its arrival was totally unexpected. It has occurred to them after 2,000. The hibakusha patient says that there is no end, or it is as if there is a nuclear bomb in the body. The first peak of leukemia was over many years ago. This is the second peak, but for this there is no cure.
This is the kind of story that we still have to hear. Will it impress on us the futility of the nuclear weapons, and the theory of nuclear deterrence, which tries to justify the expansion of the nuclear arsenal? If so, the Nuclear-free Northeast Asia will come very much in sight. Hiroshima and Nagasaki will occupy a pivotal point in this development. Is it not the tale of two bombed cities?
As in Hiroshima, the Mayor of Nagasaki has read out his Declaration for Peace. And again as in the former, it has requested the Government to take some concrete and urgent steps at the UN and elsewhere to join forces with other peace-loving people and organizations. He has made specific reference to the desirability of the Nuclear-free Northeast Asia. On those points, the two Mayors are much more advanced than the Prime Minister, Mr.Abe Shinzo. He spoke next, but his speech was not to the point, lukewarm, non-responsive.
Let me summarize here a very valuable radio-activity related medical research which was broadcast by Japan's NHK for 75 minutes in the evening of 6 August, the Hiroshima Day.
The small damages of the chromosome by the radioactivity remained latent, so to speak, and suddenly leukemia develops from them about a decade after the injuries. Many hibakusha (explosion-affected people)passed away in this manner. The rate of leukemia was about 20 times more than the ordinary people. The nearer the patient to the point of explosion, the higher was the rate. The incidence declined after about 20 years of the explosion.
I would think that thus far the knowledge was more or less wide-spread. What seems to be new is the following, which belongs to a new area of research. Briefly the above is not the end of the story. And sadly it is not the end of the hibakusha's suffering, either.
It has been found out that, after about 40 years more, and this is after 68 years after the two Bombs, some of the hibakusha developed MDS (Myelodysplastic Syndromes). This is a disease in which the white cells get affected by cancer. This is known as the Second Leukemia, but the research tells us that its arrival was totally unexpected. It has occurred to them after 2,000. The hibakusha patient says that there is no end, or it is as if there is a nuclear bomb in the body. The first peak of leukemia was over many years ago. This is the second peak, but for this there is no cure.
This is the kind of story that we still have to hear. Will it impress on us the futility of the nuclear weapons, and the theory of nuclear deterrence, which tries to justify the expansion of the nuclear arsenal? If so, the Nuclear-free Northeast Asia will come very much in sight. Hiroshima and Nagasaki will occupy a pivotal point in this development. Is it not the tale of two bombed cities?
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