A national association of people who contracted diseases or disabilities from medications submitted a petition Tuesday to the health minister demanding curbs in the ongoing deregulation of drug sales.
The association, Zenkoku Yakugai Higaisha Dantai Renraku Kyogikai (the National Liaison Council of Groups of Victims of Medicine-Induced Suffering), is made up of various groups.
These include groups representing people who contracted HIV or hepatitis from tainted blood products, those with congenital defects linked to thalidomide and others suffering SMON (sub-acute-myelo-optical-neuropathy), a polio-like disease caused by the diarrhea medicine chinoform.
A group representative who handed the document directly to Health, Labor and Welfare Minister Chikara Sakaguchi requested that the government ensure that medicines are sold under the guidance of pharmacists.