Host: The Japanese Pharmacological Society
Name : The 96th Annual Meeting of the Japanese Pharmacological Society
Number : 96
Location : [in Japanese]
Date : November 30, 2022 - December 03, 2022
The decline and stagnation of Japan's scientific and technological capabilities continue unabated. The number of Top 10% papers in the world was recently published, and Japan has been in a long-term stagnant trend, being overtaken by two countries this year, moving from 10th to 12th place. Surprisingly, Japan was overtaken by Spain, which had fallen behind among European countries, and its neighbor in Asia, South Korea. The cause is the Ministry of Finance (MOF) and the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT), which have been suppressing the nation's science and technology research expenditures. Since the incorporation of national universities, MOF and MEXT have been reducing the subsidies for national university management fees by 1% annually since 2004, and the amount has now been reduced by more than 10%. The Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare(MHLW) has also continued to bash basic medical research. This rejection of academia is an outrage reminiscent of the Cultural Revolution of China. Thanks to these policies, Japan's research capability has declined markedly. A good example of this is the recent outbreak of COVID-19. The development of both vaccines and therapeutics has fallen far behind Europe and the United States. Unless these policies to suppress academism, especially scientific and technological research, are immediately reversed, Japan's scientific and technological capabilities may indeed fall to the ground, and I am deeply concerned about this.
