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A Vietnamese technical trainee in Japan was sentenced to three months in prison in January 2022 and suspended from her position for two years for allegedly abandoning the bodies of stillborn twins she gave birth to while alone at home. She has appealed to the Supreme Court, claiming the verdict would have been different had the judge known the plight of foreign trainees and pregnant women. She is one of countless migrants who cannot access contraceptives and abortion pills after coming to Japan, where few options for reproductive health services exist and pharmaceutical law prevents migrants from bringing more than a two-month supply of drugs/medications including contraception without permission in advance. Furthermore, immigration laws do not allow them to bring their families. Professor Tanaka will present findings from a study that highlights changes in contraceptive use among migrants from five Asian countries to Japan and argues against Japan’s current migration policy and poor reproductive health services.
Masako Tanaka is a visiting research scholar at the CUNY SPH and a professor at the Department of Global Studies at Sophia University in Tokyo, Japan. She has been researching contraceptive options and policy gaps related to reproductive health and rights between Japan and sending countries of migrants. She is conducting research on this topic among Nepalese migrants in NYC.
