SAPPORO (Kyodo) The Sapporo District Court urged the government Tuesday to pay ¥500,000 in settlement to each asymptomatic hepatitis B virus carrier as it issued the first judicial view in a series of lawsuits filed nationwide by patients and carriers believed infected during group vaccinations.
While presenting its view on the most controversial point of whether to cover asymptomatic carriers in the settlement package, the court also called on the state to pay from ¥12.5 million to ¥36 million to those who have developed hepatitis B, depending on their condition, their lawyers said.
The government has denied carriers who do not show symptoms of the disease the right to claim compensation on grounds that the right's statutory life of 20 years has passed, and instead proposed offering subsidies for their medical checkups.