Speaker
Hiroe Kawashimo
Hiroe Kawashimo is an atomic bomb microcephaly sufferer. Her mother was at 1km away from the hypocenter at the time of the bombing. She was 2 months pregnant then, and she gave birth to Hiroe in April 1946. In addition to having intellectual disability, she was also physically very weak, and Hiroe managed to finish middle school at the age of 20. Hiroe loves writing poems and watercolor painting. *Atomic bomb microcephaly is a post-exposure disorder caused by A-bomb radiation received in the womb. As the name "microcephaly" implies, most cases are characterized by a small head, with brain and body damage. Many of them being very weak, it was said that they cannot live long enough to reach the age of 20. In-utero atomic bomb survivors are often mistakenly thought to be second-generation survivors because they were born after the bombings. However, they are actually the youngest direct survivors of the atomic bombing.