
78 The Fukushima 2011 Disaster
Until recently, Japan held that only people who experienced the
atomic bomb blasts of Hiroshima and Nagasaki at close range were
victims, because secondary radiation posed negligible danger (Hayashi
2011). This decision has been reversed and the number of potential
victims of the World War II bombings entitled to compensation has
increased by several orders of magnitude. Likewise, many potential
victims of the Fukushima disaster will have received only secondary
radiation from eating contaminated food or inhaling dust, for example.
They too may be entitled to compensation and medical assistance for
secondary ...