The Kanagawa Prefectural Government building is seen in Yokohama's Naka Ward. (Mainichi/Akihiko Yamamoto)

       YOKOHAMA -- The Kanagawa Prefectural Government revealed Sept. 6 that it will pay 5.75 million yen (about $52,325) as settlement money to the family of a man in his 50s who died while recuperating from COVID-19 at a hotel, claiming that he was unable to be transported to a medical facility at an early stage due to a systemic flaw on the part of the prefecture.

       The prefectural government said it is a rare case in the country for a local government to pay settlement money regarding the death of a recuperating COVID-19 patient.

       According to the prefecture south of Tokyo, the man was diagnosed with a mild case of COVID-19 on Dec. 8, 2020, and was recovering at a hotel from the following day. Although there had been instances since Dec. 9 when his blood oxygen saturation levels fell below 90%, a doctor's checkup had been put off. The prefecture did not hear from the man for a health monitoring inspection scheduled for 3 p.m. on Dec. 11, and found him collapsed in the hotel room at around 8 p.m. that day. The man did not have preexisting diseases, and acute bronchial pneumonia caused by COVID-19 led to his death.

       Following the fatality, the Kanagawa Prefectural Government has created a rule to inform doctors in cases where a patient's oxygen saturation level drops to 93% or below. According to an investigation report compiled in March by a third-party committee set up by the prefecture, there were no standards for notifying doctors based on oxygen saturation levels, and it recognized that there were deficiencies in the health observation system for COVID-19 patients, including safety confirmation dependent on patients' self-reporting. Nevertheless, the report did not go as far as recognizing a connection between the prefecture's faulty system and the man's death.

       In response to the third-party committee's report, the prefectural government had been in talks with the bereaved family while acknowledging that there were shortcomings in the way it handled the man's case. The prefecture said that it presented a settlement proposal in August, and obtained approval from the family. The prefectural government will introduce a related draft for discussion to the prefectural assembly's session which begins on Sept. 8.

       (Japanese original by Nami Takata, Yokohama Bureau)

       Font Size S M L Print Timeline 0