Japan - 2 workers file for compensation over dioxin exposure

[John Visher <visherjc@crisscross.com>]

http://www.tokyo-weekly.ne.jp/

 March 26, 1999

2 workers file for compensation over dioxin exposure

 Two former employees of Osaka's cleaning center on March 26 applied for
workmen's compensation insurance -- the
first instance in Japan for reasons related to exposure to dioxin -- to
the Yodogawa Labor Standards Office in Osaka
City, claiming that they suffered from cancer and serious skin disease
because of large amounts of dioxin detected in
the facility.

 Mitsuo Takeoka, 67 and Katsuo Hatanaka, 61, are former employees of a
Toyono County waste incineration facility in
Nose Town, Osaka Prefecture.

 It was decided that the facility be dismantled due to the dioxin levels
found.

 Their applications are expected to urge the national government to
study actual damage at workshops, which have
drawn less attention even as the dioxin issue has become a more
prominent social issue.

 Takeoka worked in the center from 1988, when the center started
operations, until 1996. He had operated a crane
utilized to place waste into a furnace. He also inspected instruments in
the incineration facility.

 After he left the center, he suffered from cancer of the large
intestine and has had two operations.

 Hatanaka, who was an employee at the center from 1989 to 1998, had
compact ash generated from the incineration
process with cement. For about three years, his face and legs have been
covered with pigmentary deposits and
pimple-like dermatitis.

 Examinations showed that fat in blood samples from the plaintiffs
contains levels of dioxin nearly 16 times higher than
the standard. The lawyers claimed that their illnesses are the result of
dioxin exposure in the workplace.


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