Yasumi Iwakami Interviewing Dr. Shuntaro Hida, Who Says "There Is Nowhere to Escape in Japan"

Iwakami, who disclosed his health problems since his tour of Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant on Twitter, was interviewing Dr. Shuntaro Hida a while ago (April 12, 2012) which was live on USTREAM.

The part I caught was when Iwakami was asking the doctor about his recent ill health. Iwakami said every time he went to Fukushima he would suffer a dry cough, which would last for a while even after he came back to Tokyo. He didn't think much of that until recently.

Iwakami looked bleary. He asked Dr. Hida what he could do to improve his health, and asked for the doctor's advice to people who remain in Fukushima.

Dr. Hida said something that Hiroaki Koide of Kyoto University has been saying from the beginning of the nuclear disaster. He said, "There is nowhere to escape in Japan, because Japan is too small. Not all people in Fukushima can relocate."

Fukushima's population is about 2 million, or 1.6% of Japanese population (128 million). Surely there is enough space in Japan with rapidly declining population to absorb 2 million residents.

But Dr. Hida meant relocation of residents in the meaningful units - the entire towns and villages, and said there was no space.

That is a rather depressing thought. I don't quite understand, as a city person, why anyone should relocate with the entire town.

Dr. Hida's advice to Iwakami and people in Fukushima, and anyone who feel he/she is affected by radiation, is to lead a healthy life - get up early, eat at regular time, sleep well, enjoying the company of family and friends.

Well, by trying to appear calm in the face of the largest disaster (natural and nuclear), Japanese people as aggregate lost the opportunity to finally wake up from more than two decades of stupor and stagnation. For that majority, all they hope to do is to live like nothing happened. Dr. Hida's advice is quite appropriate in that regard, although it does make sense to strengthen the immune system to fight the effect of radiation.

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