Jintsu River

The most spectacular and publicized occurrence of cadmium poisoning resulted from dietary intake of cadmium by people in the Jintsu River Valley, near Fuchu, Japan. The victims were afflicted by itai, itai disease, which means ouch, ouch in Japanese. The symptoms are the result of painful osteomalacia (bone disease) combined with kidney malfunction. Cadmium poisoning in the Jintsu River Valley was attributed to irrigated rice contaminated from an upstream mine producing lead, zinc, and cadmium. 

Jintsu River, Toyama Pref. 3.27 (0.16-5.0) Mine effluents Goto (1973)... 

Around the same time, a different, but also a serious enviromnental problem was coming to a head along the Jintsu River at the boarder of the Toyama and Gifu prefectures (Fig. 1). It was called the Itai-itai disease and caused by cadmium from the mines in the area. Itai means aching in Japanese. It directly suggests that the patients had experienced severe pain. The patients suffered from the deterioration of their kidneys and displayed serious anemia. This illness has been mentioned as one of the four worst environmental diseases in Japan. 

Itai-Itai disease was first reported in Fuchu in Toyama Prefecture shortly after World War II but it was not known until 1961 [372] that cadmium had an etiological role in the development of this disorder. The endemic area around Fuchu is in the Jintsu River basin and was affected by the discharge of cadmium-containing effluent into the river from zinc-smelting operations upstream. In the Toyama Prefecture, the incidence of Itai-Itai disease was limited to areas... 

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