Sugahara: Where are the Healthy Cities, which about 1000 cities already have participated, centered?
Minami: They are started and centered in Europe, initiated by WHO. The Tokyo metropolitan government held a symposium in Tokyo in 1996 in order to spread the Healthy City project, inviting the people from WHO. I remember them introducing an example, a city called Horsens, where the citizens became able to participate in the Healthy City project. The city moved the office, which researched the health problems of Horsens and studies countermeasures against them, from inside the city hall to a building across the street, and changed it to a shop named “Horsens Health City Shop,” so that everybody can drop by, get information and have meetings.
Sugahara: What is the population of the city?
Minami: I don’t know. As the whole Denmark is only as big as Shikoku, I guess it’s tens of thousands.
Sugahara: It’s as big as a town or a small city in Japan, isn’t it?
Minami: I guess so.
Sugahara: How about in Hong Kong? They released all the information and announced exact countermeasures to the citizens. I heard the citizens stayed very calm as a result.
Minami: Well, I interviewed the NHK chief at that time. The Hong Kong government revealed the fact that 75% of all the domestic infected patients and most of the international cases were triggered by one doctor from Guangzhou, and exposed the infection route from the flight number to the name of the hotel.
Sugahara: It’s a matter of which one to choose, expanding of infection or protection of private information. If we have enough awareness of the threat of new-type flu, we can take countermeasures quickly like announcing the names of people who were on the same flight or something, without focusing too much on protection of private information. I think Japan is a little slow in things like this. What do you think?
Minami: You are right. A year has passed since the Private Information Protection Law passed. I see some over reactions. Some medical institutions don’t even report serious medical accidents because of the law. The meaning of the Private Information Protection Law is somewhat misunderstood. The original purpose was to balance protection of privacy and value of medical information. The text of the law allows utilizing private medical information in cases that it is important for public heath and protecting people’s lives. I think infection diseases apply to these cases, but I am worried if it will be actually applied in emergency.
Sugahara: Isn’t risk communication of journalism a mission of NHK? I think people like Mr. Minami, who understand infection diseases well, should teach the people in the company about understanding of private information protection as well as many other things, and furthermore, broadcast much more information about infection diseases and countermeasures through NHK. Japan is quite behind in this respect, compared to the U.S. and other countries.
Minami: Japan is sterilizing the feet of the people coming from Russia and China. But this is the only countermeasure Japan is taking against bird flu now.
Sugahara: I think some infected patients in Africa don’t even know what kind of disease they are infected. They have diarrhea quite often, child deaths too. In this aspect, it’s terrifying to think infected parson flies to other part of the world without even knowing he or she has a disease.
Minami: That’s possible. I don’t think China will not hide a disease intentionally anymore, like it did last time, but people in China and Southeast Asia usually don??t go to the hospital with flu. It is possible that the discovery of new-type flu delays because of this. Terrifying, isn’t it? However, the new-type flu this time is different from Spanish flu in the point that we have international cooperation in 21st century.
Sugahara: It is very reassuring for us to have people like you. I’d like you to stand in front in emergency, appearing on TV programs and so on. We should learn especially from America’s preparation on both domestic, company and state level. Like Heath City Declaration, I think it’s good that a local community, like a ward in Tokyo, has a system like storing foods, so that the residents can feel secured and happy.
