JCIEObituary

Tadashi Yamamoto
Founder of the Japan Center for International
Exchange and supporter of global healthinitiatives. Born in March, 1936, in Tokyo,Japan, he died of gallbladder cancer onApril 15, 2012, in Tokyo, aged 76 years.
Soon after the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis andMalaria was founded in 2002, its director of external relations
and partnerships, Christoph Benn, was looking for ways toengage Japan in the ﬂedgling global health funding body. A
member of the Fund’s Board gave Benn a piece of advice: “Hesaid to me, ‘there’s a person who can really help you, but he’s
never been introduced to global health’,” recalls Benn. The
name of that person was Tadashi Yamamoto.
Although he never served in a formal governmental role,
Yamamoto had been remarkably inﬂuential in the sphereof international exchange between Japan and the wider
world since the 1960s. Founder of the independent Japan
Center for International Exchange in 1970, he had been
involved in countless forms of exchange and dialogue,
such as the US–Japan Parliamentary Exchange Program.
“I know of no more important individual in Japan or theUnited States who is so eﬀective in strengthening ourbilateral ties”, Thomas S Foley, former US Ambassadorto Japan, said in 2011 when Yamamoto was awarded thehighest award for a citizen of Japan: the Order of the Rising
Sun Gold Rays with Neck Ribbon.
When Benn eventually met Yamamoto, in 2003, herecalls how “He saw the image of Japan as a soft power, andglobal health ﬁtted into that kind of thinking. And he had
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the kind of close relationships with the present and past
Prime Ministers of Japan that allowed him to ask them tobe champions for the Global Fund. He could say to themthat this was a perfect way to demonstrate Japan’s concern
for the rest of the world.” Since then, Japan has always
been a generous donor to the Fund. “None of that would
have happened without Tadashi Yamamoto”, says Benn.
Yamamoto was also the founder of the Friends of the Global
Fund, Japan, a private support group that works to harness
the support for the battle against communicable diseases. It
was the ﬁrst such organisation to form, and has since beenemulated in several other regions.
Lincoln Chen, President of the US-based China Medical
Board, notes that Yamamoto’s impact on global healthextended far beyond his relationship with the Global Fund.
He was an early promoter of the 2001–02 Commission on
Human Security co-chaired by economist Amartya Senand diplomat Sadako Ogata that had health security asa primary theme, and most importantly was a promoter
and sponsor of Japanese non-governmental organisations(NGOs) working in global health. “From large to small, fromtargeted to general, from Japan to international, the NGOs
nurtured by Tadashi have and are contributing mightily to amore peaceful, equitable, and healthy world”, Chen said.
Yamamoto’s earliest ambition had been to enter theCatholic priesthood. After graduating from Jesuit-runschools, he attended Jochi (Sophia) University where hestudied philosophy, and then took a life-changing decision
to study abroad, attending St Norbert College, a Catholic
University in Wisconsin, USA. Living in the USA at the time
when John F Kennedy was running for President and Martin
Luther King Jr was leading the civil rights movement was
an inspirational experience and when he returned to Japanin 1962, Yamamoto involved himself in overseas exchange
under Tokusaburo Kosaka, president of Shin-Etsu Chemicalcompany. His life’s course was set.
“He was a liberal internationalist, an optimist whobelieved wholeheartedly that cultural exchanges anddialogue could bring peoples and nations closer together,
especially those that previously had been adversaries”,
Barnett Baron, president and CEO of Give2Asia, wrote
recently. Remembered by those who knew him as warm,gentle, and passionate, Yamamoto had a natural gift forcommunication. “Tadashi Yamamoto was a treasure not
only for Japan but for the global community because of
his self-eﬀacing modality of work to bring Japanese andothers together around common themes of our sharedhumanity. He had a deep commitment to civil participation
for peaceful development and recognised the power andresponsibility of Japan to contribute globally”, Chen told
The Lancet. Yamamoto’s wife Chiyoko died in 2007. He issurvived by four sons and eight grandsons.

Stephen Pincock
www.thelancet.com Vol 379 May 19, 2012