The 1979 PCB poisoning led to the establishment of Taiwan's first consumer protection group, the Consumers' Foundation, which sought compensation on behalf of the victims. (Courtesy of Tosee Publisher)
By June Tsai
In April 1979, a handful of students and teachers at Taichung County's Huei Ming School in central Taiwan discovered they were suffering from rashes, or exhibiting symptoms of chloracne--a skin condition consisting of blackheads, cysts and pustules. As time went by, the number of afflicted increased to more than 100.
Tests conducted on the victims revealed they had been poisoned by PCBs, or polychlorinated biphenyls. Around 2,000 people from the nearby counties of Changhua, Hsinchu and Miaoli were eventually identified as having been exposed to the toxic chemicals.
The event shocked Taiwan and was considered "the most serious pollution-triggered poisoning event" in the island's history. Today, the scandal is the subject of the documentary "Surviving Evil" which was released in September and screens nationwide through November.
"People believed this tragedy would be properly addressed by the government and that the poison in their bodies would gradually disappear," the film's director Tsai Tsung-lung said Nov. 11, 2008. "But this has not been the case."
Tsai explained that he made this film not only to follow up on the victims, but to remind people of those shocking images from 30 years ago, which have almost faded from memory now. He added that by remaining indifferent to the event, every member of society runs the risk of becoming part of a system that allowed the tragedy to occur and threatens to do so again.
Founded in 1961, Huei Ming School was the first boarding school in Taiwan to offer free education and training to blind students of various ages. With insufficient funding to fill its coffers, the institution mainly relied on donations from abroad to keep the doors open. Administrators were forced to cut costs wherever possible, and this meant purchasing budget-priced rice oil for cooking from a local producer. After about six months of exposure to food produced with the oil, students and teachers began to develop skin rashes and blackened nails. More serious cases of chloracne developed soon after.
A test of the oil and the victims' blood samples conducted by scientists at Kyushu University in Japan confirmed they were suffering from PCB contamination, which was also found to have caused 1968's Yusho, or oil disease, in western Japan. During that poisoning, more than 14,000 people became seriously ill. They suffered from fatigue, headaches, coughing, limb numbness and unusual skin sores. Pregnant women later delivered babies with birth defects. These people had eaten food that was cooked with contaminated rice oil. PCBs had accidentally leaked into the oil during the manufacturing process.
Outlawed toward the end of the 1970s, PCBs were valued for their chemical stability and fire resistance. They were manufactured and processed primarily for use as insulating fluids and coolants in electrical equipment and machinery from 1929 to 1977. It was presumed that PCBs were used at the Changhua County-based rice oil producer, with leakage from a heating apparatus occurring during the refining process.
According to Guo Yue-liang, a medical professor at National Taiwan University, PCBs are a persistent organic pollutant that accumulates in animals and plants. "PCBs are passed down through the generations and can affect internal organs, nerves and the immunity system of a person for their whole life," he said. Guo, who is researching the health impact of the toxic chemicals, pointed out that connecting the pollutant with other diseases remains a pending issue.
Following identification of the poisoning's source, production was halted at the rice oil factory and the owner jailed. But this was of little comfort to his victims. The owner's eventual death behind bars meant that those who were poisoned never received compensation for their suffering and loss. Although the government provided subsidies and medical assistance at the time, victims received no systematic follow-up care, except the 2,000 who were issued "oil disease cards." The card qualified them for reduced medical fees and other benefits, yet when the budget ran out, the card became worthless.
Although only seven Huei Ming School victims died in the years following the poisoning, the number affected stands beyond 2,000. Survivors faced deteriorating health aggravated by their economically disadvantaged status. Social discrimination also dogged them, with some moving to other parts of the country to avoid stigmatization. Some, being afraid of passing the affliction onto their offspring, gave up on having children. As shown in the film, one victim only understood why her children had suffered from years of sickness after the director sought her out for interview. "The social impact of the incidents on the victims and their families has never been researched," Tsai said. "They have been totally forgotten."
The documentary traces what happened to the victims over the past decades. One blind victim, a mother of three and board member of the local Association for the Blind, had to fight against her abusive ex-husband and "maddening" government bureaucracy for custody rights of her daughter. It also shows how another former student of Huei Ming, now a masseur, resolved to make the best out of life by sharing his experience with victims at a conference on dioxin contamination in Japan in 2007.
Then principal Chen Hsu-jin--the first to suspect that poisoned food might have been responsible for the contamination--has been struggling to attract the government's attention and support for her former students and other victims through the formation of a self-help group. Now over 70 years of age, Chen is fighting her own illnesses that she believes are connected to PCB poisoning.
The film's director stated that while Chen and the other surviving victims have learned to live with the poisoning, they are now faced with a bigger challenge. "The victims are confronted by two evils," Tsai said. "Their poor health and society's indifference to their plight." He explained that the lack of research into the disease and its impact means the "evils" of the poisoning and ensuing injustice also survives to this day.
"Their experience is significant for each one of us. Given that various toxicities, such as dioxin, have also infiltrated into the soil and became part of our environment, we may actually be living with poisons too," Tsai cautioned. "If the victims had received ongoing care, the poisoning issue would not be an issue today."
Yet it seems easier to forget than to care. The film opens with a voice-over: "Isn't the melamine contamination outbreak a repeat of PCB poisoning in Taiwan from 30 years ago? And isn't the latter a repeat of what happened in Japan 40 years ago? Unless we remember the past, the next tragedy is just around the corner." It closes with a message laden in significance for Taiwan's leaders, "[we don't know] whereto people with eyes will lead Taiwan, but blind people will definitely find their own way."
The film makes a clear political allusion, paralleling Taiwan's process of democratization with the survivors' lives. Tsai lamented that during the past 30 years, political dissents of yore became government leaders and lost power again. Past rulers stepped down but were back again. Taiwan grows rich, yet something is cast into oblivion--victims of degraded environments.
Though some critics doubted the necessity of including political comments in the film, the director said he chose to do so because in a broader sense, politics contributed to the "surviving evil" of the food contamination and its social consequences for affected people, and politics is the key to redressing them.
In Japan, an act was passed to compensate victims of Yusho in 2006, and a comprehensive investigation started this year. In Taiwan, "Surviving Evil" is hoping to raise public awareness of the decades-old tragedy. In response to the film, social activists on the island have launched the process of starting a civic organization to support victims through medical assistance, daily care, legislation lobbying and international networking.
"For me, politics involves achieving the public good. We have to care and make demands on politicians and the government. That is our responsibility," Tsai concluded.
(This article first appeared in Taiwan Journal Nov. 21, 2008.)
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