Number of Hiroshima A-bomb victims raised to 541,817

Japan Policy & Politics, Oct 18, 1999

HIROSHIMA, Oct. 12 Kyodo

The number of people whose deaths or ailments are attributed by the Hiroshima municipal government to the Aug. 6, 1945 atomic bombing of the city has increased by 19,153 in the last four years to 541,817, according to a local government survey released Tuesday.

Of this figure, 372,705 people are considered to have suffered from direct exposure to radiation from the 15-kiloton uranium bomb that leveled almost 90% of the western Japanese city 54 years ago.

The survey, which covered four fiscal years from April 1995 to March 1999, also made upward adjustments in the number of atomic bomb deaths from the fiscal 1991-1994 survey, adding 26,486 names for a total of 273,212 atomic bomb-related deaths, the city said.

Using population records at the end of World War II, the municipal government also readjusted the estimated number of those who died in the bombing and its immediate aftermath up to the end of 1945 by 1,000 to 88,865.

This figure, while slightly higher than before, still falls far short of the estimated figure of 140,000 widely believed -- and even reported to the United Nations -- to have been killed out of Hiroshima's population of 340,000 by the end of 1945.

The survey, the sixth of its kind, stated the need to use documents about military personnel posted to Hiroshima at the time, as well as to uncover more records about entire families wiped out because of the blast.

It also noted that the number of atomic bomb victims dying from old age more than half a century after the bombing is increasing.

The latest survey also used and incorporated materials on 92,000 cases, including a study conducted by the Health and Welfare Ministry in November 1995 on the current status of atomic bomb victims.