Maintaining cleanliness is costly, and poverty and filth once existed side by side throughout the world.
Kimindo Kusaka discusses Japan’s universal health insurance system, the pharmaceutical industry, the conflict between the United States and China, and the transfer of Japanese research ideas to China, arguing that the coronavirus crisis leaves Japan no choice but to say “Nippon First.”

June 30, 2020
Cleanliness is costly.
That is why the entire world was filthy in those days.
Cleanliness was monopolised by the wealthy, while poverty and filth existed side by side.
The following is taken from Kimindo Kusaka’s regular column entitled “Let Us Say ‘Nippon First,’” published in the monthly magazine WiLL.
The monthly magazine WiLL is essential reading not only for the Japanese people but also for people throughout the world.
Anyone who has not yet subscribed should immediately head to the nearest bookstore.
That is because it is filled with genuine essays such as this one.
And yet, it costs only 920 yen, including consumption tax.
For better or worse, the coronavirus problem emerged at the beginning of 2020, and an age in which people discuss the post-coronavirus world from various perspectives is about to begin.
The first question is whether the coronavirus was a natural disaster or a man-made disaster, but what will remain after that is the conflict between China and the United States.
In the United States, Democrats and Republicans are coming together and discussing various measures, such as demanding and collecting compensation from Xi Jinping’s China or suspending the redemption of the US Treasury securities already held by China.
The major question is how this will affect President Trump’s election in November.
What comes to mind is Fujita Toko, a samurai of the Mito Domain during the closing years of the Tokugawa shogunate, who praised the spirit of Japan and the Japanese people with the words, “When released, it becomes ten thousand branches of cherry blossoms…when condensed, it becomes steel forged a hundred times,” and continued, “We are the clean people of the divine land.”
＊Author’s note: To possess justice, sincerity, and convictions for correcting the world, together with the determination and spirit to put them resolutely into action＊
Because cleanliness was emphasised endlessly during our primary-school years, hearing the word may suddenly seem to lower the dignity of the subject.
Yet, amid the present coronavirus turmoil, we can now understand that it was by no means an insignificant matter.
Cleanliness is costly.
That is why the entire world was filthy in those days.
Cleanliness was monopolised by the wealthy, while poverty and filth existed side by side.
There was a reason why children discriminated against a classmate by calling that child a “germ.”
At that time, I overheard a village doctor say, “It is easy to put an end to the suffering of unfortunate people.
Give them money rather than medicine.”
I thought, “Is economics more important than medicine?”
Now, that has truly become the case.
Because Japan has renounced war under its Constitution, it has enormous financial leeway to that extent.
The fact that Japan’s health insurance coverage rate is almost 100 percent is one of the seven wonders of the world, but once health insurance became widespread, intractable and mysterious diseases first disappeared.
That was because insurance produced organised statistical data, allowing such diseases to be discovered immediately.
When statistical data are available, pharmaceutical companies can also concentrate their efforts on those areas.
Because sales forecasts can be made, medicines expected to sell are mass-produced and become less expensive.
Moreover, as chemistry advances, it becomes possible to examine the structural formula of a new medicine and understand the effects it was developed to produce.
When such a medicine sells well, other companies begin producing similar products.
Patent wars and advertising wars then begin.
Because larger pharmaceutical companies enjoy an advantage, major mergers proceed.
The growing similarity among medicines leads to growing similarity among companies and also to the revival of generic medicines.
What, in the first place, is a medicinal effect?
While people are considering how much truth there is in the saying, “Even the head of a sardine inspires faith,” the germs themselves are changing.
The coronavirus may differentiate into four types, or perhaps there is a “thinking coronavirus” because it changes beyond the countermeasures devised by human beings.
The problem is advancing further and further ahead of human thought.
The word virus originally means a microorganism too small to be seen through a microscope, so no matter how long Hideyo Noguchi looked through his microscope, he should have seen nothing.
Yet, textbooks do not mention this.
A statue of Hideyo Noguchi stands in a corner of the university established by Rockefeller.
It may honour not his research achievements but rather his determination to challenge a new field with the spirit that he would not be defeated by white people.
I believe Japanese people of former times visited that place with such feelings, but things are now very different.
There is a story that, when the French Revolution had finally settled down, the survivors looked at one another and said, “Somehow, only those who were good with words survived.”
That marked the beginning of the modern age.
The modern age is filled with new terminology.
So, what will today’s Japanese people, who are so skilled with words, say?
Or have the Japanese people, having become wealthy, ceased to say anything at all?
The answer may differ from person to person, but scholars want research funding above all else.
They also want research subjects.
Just when they are thinking that they must produce results as quickly as possible, an invitation to undertake new research arrives from China.
When they have a research subject they have long been developing, they discuss it.
Whether they are teaching the Chinese or having their ideas stolen is unclear.
However, it is easy to understand how joint research between Japan and China begins to flourish in such circumstances.
The next stage is the appearance of large numbers of people whose names are listed as members of joint research organisations created by China.
After that, President Trump becomes angry and stops the outflow of ideas.
The banner under which he does so is “America First.”
Japan, several steps behind, has only now begun to say, “Scholarship has no borders, but scholars have national borders.”
Faced with the coronavirus crisis, the Japanese people will have no choice but to say “Nippon First.”