The Transport Ministry has set up a new system to add to fares “barrier-free fees” to be shouldered by passengers to accelerate efforts to install platform doors and other facilities.
East Japan Railway Co, or JR East, Tokyo Metro Co. and other railway operators raised their regular fares for train services in Tokyo and neighboring prefectures by 10 yen on Saturday.
These companies will use increased revenues to install elevators and platform doors and make other efforts to improve barrier-free accessibility at train stations.
The Japanese government gave the People’s Honor Award to Shingo Kunieda, the most successful men’s wheelchair tennis player of all time, on Friday.
“Without the predecessors who played wheelchair tennis before me, I wouldn’t have had the environment to play myself,” Kunieda said at an award ceremony at the prime minister’s office.
On 14th March, the Japanese Government decided to require businesses and other operators to provide ‘reasonable accommodations’, such as installing ramps for wheelchair users at shop entrances and exits, from 1 April 2024. The Cabinet approved the Cabinet Order on the revised Disability Discrimination Law. Until now, the State and local authorities have been obliged to provide reasonable accommodation, while the start date of the obligation for businesses was undecided.
A director of a corporation that operates facilities for the disabled was arrested for sexually assaulting a teenage female user. The Kumamoto District Court sentenced him to five years in prison.
Corporal punishment, specifically whipping, has been systemically used by followers of the Jehovah’s Witnesses religious group against their children in Japan, a survey showed Tuesday.
On 14th March, the Government decided to require businesses and other operators to provide ‘reasonable accommodations’, such as installing ramps for wheelchair users at shop entrances and exits, from 1 April 2024.
Oe won the Nobel Prize in 1994 as he was working on the “A Flaming Green Tree” trilogy. The prize was awarded for works including the novel “A Personal Matter” — which was dedicated to his son, the composer Hikari Oe — solidifying his place in contemporary literature.
Hikari Ōe was born and developmentally disabled. Doctors tried to convince his parents to let their son die, but they refused to do so. Even after an operation, Ōe remained visually impaired, developmentally disabled and epileptic, with limited physical coordination.
The Japanese government revised its COVID-19 face mask guidance on Monday 13th March, leaving individuals to decide whether to wear masks both indoors and outdoors.
A company operating day care facilities for children with disabilities in nine locations in the prefecture, including Beppu City, was found to have fraudulently received approximately 34 million yen in benefits by padding the number of staff, and Oita Prefecture has decided to cancel the designation of the facilities.
Ibaraki prefecture will ask bus companies for cooperation to evacuate senior residents and disabled people. The prefectural government estimates that more than 400 buses will be needed for the task, and it does not know how it can secure that many buses.
In a wide-area evacuation plan designed by the Ibaraki prefectural government, residents are supposed to leave in their own cars.
The prefecture will ask bus companies for cooperation to evacuate senior residents and disabled people.
The prefectural government estimates that more than 400 buses will be needed for the task, and it does not know how it can secure that many buses.
One guiding principle of the nuclear emergency preparedness was created in response to the 2011 Fukushima disaster.
A director of a corporation that operates facilities for the disabled was arrested for sexually assaulting a teenage female user. The Kumamoto District Court sentenced him to five years in prison.
In December 2022 Mark R. Bookman, a Disability Studies scholar and postgraduate fellow at Tokyo College at the University of Tokyo died. On 1st March an article he was co-authoring with Prof. Carolyn S. Stevens of Monash University about the COVID-19 pandemic in Japan and Australia was published open-access by Ritsumeikan University.
The Japanese government Friday decided to give the People’s Honor Award to wheelchair tennis giant Shingo Kunieda. Kunieda, 39, will be the first parasports athlete to receive the prestigious award. The award ceremony will be held at the prime minister’s office March 17.
A video showing the legs of apparently able-bodied people entering an elevator or lift in Japan has been doing the rounds on ‘Japan Twitter’. As someone with cerebral palsy, I thought I would weigh in.
In November 2022, hearings for a damages lawsuit after a girl with impaired hearing was killed in a traffic accident in Osaka in 2018, estimating lost wages have become a key point of contention.
A car driven by a 71-year-old man crashed into a hospital in the western Japan city of Osaka on Wednesday, killing two women, local police and other sources said.
Tokyo police served a fresh arrest warrant Tuesday for an executive of a nonprofit organization on suspicion of brokering an organ transplant for another patient, without permission from Japan’s health minister.
The suspect has denied the charges, according to police sources.
In November 2022, hearings for a damages lawsuit after a girl with impaired hearing was killed in a traffic accident in 2018, estimating lost wages have become a key point of contention.
The Osaka District Court ruled on February 27th that the defendant pay approximately 37.7 million yen. This amount – 85% of the average wage – it was ruled, was the amount Ayuka Ide might have earned in the future as Ayuka Ide was able to “use various means and techniques to reduce the impact of her hearing impairment.”
The Jehovah’s Witnesses religious group is continuing to instruct its followers to forbid blood transfusions for their children in violation of health ministry guidelines on preventing harm to children, according to a lawyers’ report that was set to be submitted to the government Monday.
Kyodo News conducted a survey of people with intellectual disabilities and their families nationwide regarding the problem of people with intellectual disabilities being sterilized or treated at a group home in Hokkaido, it was found on February 26 that approximately one in five (19%) people in their 20s or older have experienced opposition or restrictions from those around them regarding love, marriage or childbirth.
Kyodo News conducted a survey of people with intellectual disabilities and their families nationwide regarding the problem of people with intellectual disabilities being sterilized or treated at a group home in Hokkaido, , it was found on February 26 that approximately one in five (19%) people in their 20s or older have experienced opposition or restrictions from those around them regarding love, marriage or childbirth.
A Japanese court on Friday ordered the government to pay damages to a hearing-impaired woman who underwent forced sterilization under a now-defunct eugenics protection law, the fourth such ruling.
The Shizuoka District Court found the 1948 law unconstitutional and awarded 16.5 million yen ($123,000) to the plaintiff, a resident of the central Japan prefecture, who filed the lawsuit in 2019 claiming she underwent sterilization surgery in 1970.
It is the fourth case in which damages have been awarded over forced sterilization, following rulings by the Tokyo and Osaka high courts and the Kumamoto District Court.
At approximately 6PM on September 25th, 2007, 25-year-old Kenta Yasunaga was cycling home from a workshop he regularly attended in Saga Prefecture, southwestern Japan, when police officers attempted to stop him, believing him to be acting suspiciously.
However, Kenta Yasunaga had difficulties in communicating due to his autism. Kenta Yasunaga would later die at the hospital to which he was taken and his cause of death was found to be acute cardiac arrest.
At approximately 6PM on September 25th, 2007, 25-year-old Kenta Yasunaga was cycling home from a workshop he regularly attended in Saga Prefecture, southwestern Japan, when police officers attempted to stop him, believing him to be acting suspiciously. However, Kenta Yasunaga had difficulties in communicating due to his autism. Five officers seized him as he fiercely resisted and moaned in distress. His hands were cuffed behind his back, and he soon fell unconscious. Kenta Yasunaga would later die at the hospital to which he was taken and his cause of death was found to be acute cardiac arrest.
A plan is unfolding to invite the national para-ski team of Ukraine, where Russian forces continue their invasion, to an international competition to be held in Sapporo in March.
February 24th marks one year since the war in Ukraine began and a survey about awareness of disability discrimination produced by Japan’s Cabinet Office has been released.
The proportion of people in Japan who recognized discrimination or prejudice against those with disabilities rose 4.6 percentage points to 88.5 pct in 2022 from 2017, a survey by the Cabinet Office showed Tuesday.
This, in my experience as a person with a disability in Japan, is a common occurrence with ‘Accessible Toilets’ in Japan. The previous user seemingly leaves the diaper or nappy ‘changing station’ in the ‘down position’ making it difficult or impossible for a wheelchair user or walking stick user to enter the room.
A 28-year-old former employee of a support facility for people with disabilities in Wakkanai was arrested on suspicion of assault at the facility for deliberately putting their foot on a resident and causing the resident to fall over. The police are investigating in detail whether the abuse was a regular occurrence.
A survey by a private organization found that 69% of people with disabilities said they were unaware of the state subsidy paid to companies that support the assistance of disabled people in employment. The organizations say that the system is not well known and would like to ask the government to make it known in order to promote the system.
A survey by a private organization found that 69% of people with disabilities said they were unaware of the state subsidy paid to companies that support the assistance of disabled people in employment. The organizations say that the system is not well known and would like to ask the government to make it known in order to promote the system.
Kanagawa Prefecture will start new measures from the new fiscal year to support people with severe disabilities so that they can live in the area they want.
A survey by the Hokkaido prefectural government found that there are at least nine towns and villages in the prefecture that prohibit people with intellectual disabilities from sitting on the council through bylaws or regulations. The prefecture is calling for action, such as considering amendments to the ‘Act for the Elimination of Disability Discrimination’, on the grounds that this may be in violation of the Act.
A survey by the Hokkaido prefectural government found that there are at least nine towns and villages in the prefecture that prohibit people with intellectual disabilities from sitting on the council through bylaws or regulations. The prefectural is calling for action, such as considering amendments to the ‘Act for the Elimination of Disability Discrimination’, on the grounds that this may be in violation of the Act.
In the last few days, there were two incidents involving both suspected theft and fraud at facilities for people with disabilities in Japan.
A staff member at an employment support facility for people with disabilities in Nagoya was arrested on suspicion of theft and other offences for stealing the cash card of a male user of the facility, handing it to another user of the facility, and forced him to withdraw approximately 1.3 million yen in cash from an ATM.
A day service facility in Date City that provides after-school care for children with disabilities was found not to meet legal standards for staffing, and the prefecture took administrative action to suspend the facility’s operator designation for three months on the grounds that it had fraudulently received around 15 million yen in benefits.
On 13th February, the Kyoto District Court held the first trial of Junko Yamamoto’s mother, 78, who was accused of conspiring with her son, former doctor Naoki Yamamoto, 45, and others to kill her husband in 2011, a crime for which he received 13 years in prison. Junko said: ‘I did not kill my husband and I did not conspire with him. I am not guilty” and denied the indictment.
The Tokyo police have arrested the head of a Yokohama-based nonprofit organization on suspicion of arranging organs for transplants without government permission.
In January this year, a woman who lives in Ota Ward, Tokyo, who has cerebral palsy, a speech impediment palsy and uses home visiting care contracted a new variant of the coronavirus and requested to be admitted to a metropolitan hospital, but was refused.
Sources say this is the first time for a person to be arrested in Japan on suspicion of brokering organ transplants overseas without permission.
In January this year, a woman who lives in Ota Ward, Tokyo, who has cerebral palsy, a speech impediment palsy and uses home visiting care contracted a new variant of the coronavirus and requested to be admitted to a metropolitan hospital, but was refused.
Kyoto District Court on Tuesday sentenced former doctor Naoki Yamamoto, 45, to 13 years in prison for killing his father in 2011, against 20 years sought by the prosecution. Yamamoto had previously been arrested and charged by the Kyoto District Public Prosecutors Office on Thursday August 13th 2020 for allegedly killing Yuri Hayashi, a woman with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), an intractable disease, at the victim’s request.
According to the verdict, Yamamoto conspired with his mother, 78, and fellow doctor Yoshikazu Okubo, 44, to kill his father, Yasushi, then 77, by unknown means in a Tokyo apartment in March 2011.
The number of users of a national programme to subsidise the cost of assistance needed during employment so that people with severe disabilities can work was found to be limited to 92 people in 26 municipalities. Many municipalities are reluctant to implement the project because they are unsure whether there is demand for it.
Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida has instructed government officials to consider giving Japanese wheelchair tennis legend Shingo Kunieda the People’s Honor Award, Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno said Friday 3rd February. Kunieda would be the first para-athlete to receive the award since its establishment in 1977.
The average number of influenza patients per hospital in Japan in the week ended Sunday came to 10.36, exceeding the warning level of 10 for the first time in three years, the health ministry said Friday.
Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida has instructed government officials to consider giving Japanese wheelchair tennis legend Shingo Kunieda the People’s Honor Award, Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno said Friday.
Barrier Free Japan