TOKYO - A Hiroshima court issued a rare ruling Wednesday expanding the designation of atomic bomb survivors to include more people hit by radioactive"black rain", 75 years after the US nuclear attack on Japan at the end of World War II.
After the war, the central government designated certain areas as having been significantly impacted by the bombing, and offered free medical care to those who were there at the time. "There is no irrationality in the residents' statements that they were soaked in the black rain," presiding judge Yoshiyuki Takashima told the court, according to broadcaster NHK.
Japan offers generous healthcare for the elderly. Those who are 75 or older pay 10 per cent of costs, but the case also carried symbolic value for those who have argued for years that they too suffered in the horrific attack.