MINAMATA, Kumamoto Pref. (Kyodo) Sumiko Kaneko, 74, hopes to outlive, even by a day, her 50-year-old son, Yuji, who has been in a wheelchair the past nine years.
"His condition is getting worse, and now even we family members do not understand what he says or wants," she said of her third son, who suffers congenital Minamata disease. "He must feel miserable that he cannot express his feelings to people, while I myself have had sleepless nights thinking about him."
Her oldest son has also been diagnosed with the mercury-poisoning disease, while her second son died just 29 days after birth. She was recognized as a patient in 1972.