Minamata is a small town in southern Kyushu, Japan, belonging to Kumamoto Prefecture. There are 40,000 people in the town, and there are more than 1 1,000 farmers and fishermen living in the surrounding villages. The town is surrounded by fire and Minamata Bay, and the fishery is very developed. 1925, a capitalist built a small factory here called Japan Nitrogen Fertilizer Company, and seven years later expanded the synthetic acetic acid plant. 1949 began to produce vinyl chloride. 1956 the output exceeded 6000 tons, and the enterprise developed, but it was followed by a disaster. 1950, in a small fishing village near Minamata Bay, some cats were found to have unsteady gait, cramped and paralyzed, and finally jumped into the water and drowned. Locals call them "suicide cats", but no one studies it. From 65438 to 0953, some people with strange diseases were found in Minamata town. At first it was slurred speech, unsteady walking and facial dementia, and later it was blind and deaf, and the whole body was paralyzed. Finally, they went insane, fell asleep for a while, got excited again for a while, and bent down and shouted to death. 1in April, 956, a 6-year-old girl was admitted to hospital with the same symptoms. The initial diagnosis is a brain disease, which has not been taken seriously. In May, another 4 patients were hospitalized. After investigation, more than 50 patients have not yet been admitted to hospital. This has attracted the attention of some people in the local Kumamoto University School of Medicine. Together with the Municipal Medical Association and the hospital, they formed the Countermeasures Committee for Minamata Disease and Strange Diseases to investigate. In the investigation, it is confirmed that this is not an infectious disease, and the strange phenomenon of cat and human death is linked and analyzed, and the root cause of fish poisoning is found.
In June, 1957, 1 1, thousands of fishermen were unemployed due to fish poisoning. Unemployed fishermen held a fishermen's meeting along the coast, and more than 400 people jointly protested to the factory. /kloc-in the spring of 0/958, in order to hide people's eyes and ears, the factory extended the poisonous water discharged into Minamata Bay to the north of Minamata River. Six or seven months later, there were 18 cases of mercury poisoning in this newly polluted area, which aroused the indignation of fishermen. Hundreds of fishermen captured the New Japan Nitrogen Fertilizer Company and destroyed the local official institutions. However, the factory management refused to admit the fact that sewage poisoned residents.
From February 65438 to February 0959, Japan Food Poisoning Committee believed that Minamata disease was related to heavy metal poisoning, especially mercury. After investigation by Kumamoto University, toxic methylmercury was found at the outlet of dead bodies, fish bodies and factory sewage pipes. The mercury concentration in the sludge near the sewage outlet is above 200pm, and the farther away from the sewage outlet, the lower the mercury concentration. This reveals the secret of Minamata disease. Originally, when the company produced vinyl chloride and vinyl acetate, it adopted a low-cost mercury catalyst (mercury chloride and mercury sulfate) process, and discharged a large amount of toxic water waste residue containing methyl mercury into Minamata Bay and the unknown sea of fire, which poisoned fish and caused people to die from eating poisoned fish. The truth about Minamata disease came out. 1962, a man named Hosokawa Morihiro in the hospital of New Japan Nitrogen Fertilizer Company did a cat experiment, which completely confirmed that Minamata disease was related to the wastewater from the factory, but the business owner ordered him to keep it strictly confidential until this man died in 1970. In view of the obstruction of the capitalists in this factory and the opposition of the local authorities to the publication of the truth of this incident, the incident was not investigated and dealt with, which led to the spread of Minamata disease in Japan. 1963, a large number of "suicide cats" and "suicide dogs" appeared on the west coast of Japan. 1964 In a short time after 90% of cats committed suicide in August, the number of patients with Minamata disease in this county increased to 45, and 5 people died. The most fish eaten by these patients is Akeyagawa, which is the result of mercury-containing wastewater discharged from Lusai factory, another monopoly enterprise, which is the cause of the second Minamata disease. According to 1972, the Japanese Environment Agency announced that there were 283 people suffering from mercury poisoning in the above two areas, of which 60 people had died. The actual number of victims far exceeds this figure, and there are about 654.38+00000 victims in Minamata alone.
Minamata disease in Japan has not been proved to be an infectious disease. In the investigation, the strange phenomenon of cat and human death was linked and analyzed, and the root cause of fish poisoning was found. However, the real root of Minamata disease in Japan lies in the nitrogen fertilizer company established by Japanese capitalists, which discharged a large amount of toxic water waste residue containing methylmercury into Minamata Bay and the unknown sea of fire, poisoning fish, while people died of eating toxic fish.
At present, the problem of human living environment is becoming more and more serious. Environmental problems such as "greenhouse effect", ozone layer destruction, cross-border transfer and diffusion of toxic and harmful wastes, air pollution and acid rain, sharp decline of forest area, desertification and marine pollution seriously plague human beings and threaten their survival. Minamata disease in Japan has sounded the alarm for Japan, which is close to the sea, and has also aroused people's further concern about environmental pollution all over the world.