Spate of 'detergent suicides' hits Japan
A 24-year-old Japanese man killed himself by mixing laundry detergent and cleaning fluids, releasing noxious fumes into the air and forcing the evacuation of hundreds of people from their homes. The man mixed the chemicals in his home in Otaru, on the island of Hokkaido and was found dead shortly after midnight Wednesday. Around 350 people were forced to flee their homes to escape the poisonous fumes, thought to be hydrogen sulfide. The man's mother fell unconscious after inhaling the fumes and was taken to a hospital where she later recovered, a Hokkaido prefectural police spokesman said. The latest death comes after a 14-year-old Japanese girl killed herself using the same method last week. Ninety neighbors were sickened by fumes and had to be treated in the incident in southwestern Japan. In the week the girl died, a 31-year-old man outside Tokyo killed himself inside a car by mixing detergent and bath salts, police said. Hydrogen sulfide gas is colorless and has a similar odor to that of rotten eggs. When inhaled, it can lead to suffocation or brain damage. Police in Kori, northern Japan, Thursday also arrested a farmer for allegedly trying to kill his 82-year-old mother with the same gas by mixing toilet cleaner with mothballs in a bucket, The Associated Press reported. The farmer, Nobuya Matsuno, was mixing the chemicals on Wednesday when his 80-year-old father caught him and called police, a Fukushima prefecture police spokesman said, also on condition of anonymity because of policy, according to AP. The suicides are seen as part of a spate of detergent-related deaths that experts say have been encouraged by Internet suicide sites since last summer. Seiji Yoshikawa, deputy head of the Internet Hot Line, which operates under the guidelines of police, said the number of sites promoting detergent suicides soared in April. "They are rife on the Internet. Writing examples include 'you can die easily and beautifully' and 'this is much easier than charcoal-burning suicide," Yoshikawa said, referring to a once-popular suicide method, AP reported. A day before the Otaru incident, alarmed by the wave of detergent suicides, Japan's National Police Agency urged Internet providers Wednesday to delete materials from Web sites showing readers how to mix the chemicals, officials said Thursday. Some sites reportedly provide "poison gas" warnings that viewers can print out and hang outside their doors when they kill themselves. However, the recipes could still be accessed from various Web sites Thursday. Media reports in Japan also suggested that the number of similar deaths had reached about 50 this year, including several cases in which bystanders were sickened. Japan has one of the highest rates of suicide in the world and the Japanese government, recently announced its goal of cutting the suicide rate by 20 percent in 10 years by reducing unemployment, boosting workplace counseling and filtering Web sites that promote suicide. |
