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Julian Ryall

More than 15 per cent of hospitals and long-term medical care facilities across Japan have recorded cases of sexual assault or abuse of patients, according to a new government report, as concerns mount that the actual figures may be higher.
The Children and Families Agency released the results of the survey – the first of its kind – on Tuesday, with 1,113 institutions of the 5,000 invited to take part providing responses.
Many of the incidents involved medical staff in psychiatry and psychosomatic departments at hospitals, or within internal medical department.
Most – or 66.7 per cent – of the individuals who reported sexual abuse were aged between 19 and 39. Only 3.3 per cent were from 12 to 18.

The numbers for the younger age group looked questionable, said Yoko Tsukamoto, a professor at the Health Sciences University of Hokkaido.
“The numbers for school-age children seem too low,” she said. “My feeling is that teenage children are less likely to report cases of being touched inappropriately because they will do as they are told by a doctor. That’s why I think the actual number in that age group is probably higher.”
In the nine years to the 2025 financial year, the council on medical ethics that advises the ministry of health imposed administrative penalties on more than 150 medical staff for sexually abusing patients, Jiji Press reported. Of the total, 82 incidents involved doctors, 38 nurses and 22 dentists.
‘Very worrying’
In May 2024, Masayuki Kawasaki, the president of the Omuta National Hospital in Fukuoka prefecture, apologised in a press conference after it was determined that patients with severe mental and physical disabilities were being sexually abused.
The incidents came to light five months earlier when an inpatient complained about being inappropriately touched by a male nurse. An internal investigation was immediately launched, Kawasaki said, and found that five male nurses had abused 11 severely disabled male and female patients.
“I am sorry that these incidents occurred due to a lack of a management system at the hospital,” he said at the time. “From now on, we would like to deepen our staff’s understanding of abuse and prevent its recurrence.”


The case was not an outlier. Jun Izawa, a psychiatrist who ran a clinic in Tokyo, was arrested on April 2 on suspicion of sexually assaulting a female patient in her twenties in an examination room, while 24-year-old male nurse Yusuke Takagi was arrested in Gifu city in September last year on suspicion of groping the breasts of a woman in her twenties, who was unable to resist as she was sedated.
In a statement, Gifu Municipal Hospital said: “This is an extremely heinous abuse of his position. We urge management and supervisors to reflect deeply and ensure such an incident never happens again.”
Tsukamoto called the study “very worrying”.
“The obvious question is how many cases have gone unreported as this is the first by the agency,” she said. “It appears that people who are being treated as inpatients at long-term care facilities are the most at risk of this kind of abuse. If they are mentally or physically challenged, they are particularly vulnerable.”
She was particularly concerned for young children, especially if they were not accompanied by an adult or old enough to realise they were being sexually abused.
Flip side
The survey also raised another cause for concern – not for patients but for those on the other side of the examination table, Tsukamoto said.
The professor of nursing recounted the experience of a male colleague who was accused of sexual abuse after examining a woman with breast cancer under sedation.
“It can be very difficult because the very nature of the medical profession requires doctors and nurses to physically touch their patients and, if someone is confused or frightened about their treatment, then that can be misunderstood,” she said.
In December, new legislation based on Britain’s Disclosure and Barring Service comes into effect and permits employers in the education sector to examine the backgrounds of job applicants to determine whether they have ever been charged with inappropriate contact with children.

The registry does not cover medical professionals but there are calls for it to be extended to the sector.
An editorial by the Yomiuri newspaper in February, when the agency’s study was being conducted, said: “There is no end to incidents involving indecent acts committed by doctors and nurses against patients. Some of the victims are minors.”
Pointing out it was likely that many other incidents had not come to light, the editorial called for the registry to be expanded into the healthcare sector and the introduction of rules mandating at least one other person to be present during a medical examination.
“A doctor’s job is to save patients,” it concluded. “It is heinous to sexually assault someone suffering from an ailment and cause them further distress. Efforts must be made to improve the quality of doctors, such as by enhancing educational programmes at university medical schools to ensure they acquire high professional ethics.”


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This Week in Asia

Health & Environment

News

Asia

East Asia

Under-reporting is a concern as children and severely disabled patients may not know how to voice their complaints


Under-reporting is a concern as children and severely disabled patients may not know how to voice their complaints.


Sexual harassment and assault

Crime

Tokyo

Yomiuri Shimbun

Japan survey finds sexual abuse at 15% of hospitals. Is the true scale higher?

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Under-reporting is a concern as children and severely disabled patients may not know how to voice their complaints

Under-reporting is a concern as children and severely disabled patients may not know how to voice their complaints