Why This Topic Landed in Japan

Three unrelated stories, each about how another country's system works, drew attention in Japan the same day: a man in San Francisco billed roughly $12,873 (about 1.9 million yen) for an ambulance ride of about 9.6 km; the death in custody of a Turkish man held at Tokyo's Takao police station on suspicion of an immigration-law violation; and a report that Mexican lawmakers are preparing an antitrust complaint over Sony's plan to end PlayStation disc production by January 2028. Extreme overseas cases like these tend to be consumed in Japan as a mirror — a way to ask how generous, or how lax, the home system is. So the discussion quickly moved from the foreign examples to concrete domestic policy: charging for ambulances, detention and deportation procedures, and the future of used-game markets as software goes download-only.

Key Reaction Themes

  • Should Japan charge for ambulances? — The US bill sparked "Japan should introduce partial fees too," alongside frustration that ambulances are "free even for foreigners."
  • Questions about detention and deportation — Over the Turkish man's death, many argued he "should have been deported quickly," framing it as a procedural failure.
  • Discs, ownership, and a misguided complaint — On Sony, the common line was that the complaint misses the point because download codes will still be sold.

What Japanese Netizens Are Saying

A $12,000-plus ambulance bill in the US

A man hit by a car in San Francisco was billed about 1.9 million yen for a roughly 9.6 km ambulance ride, and the case was shared in Japan.

Sources: GIGAZINE, 2ch

Comments:

  • "Japan should stop people from calling ambulances so mindlessly and cut the ambulance budget too."
  • "Why aren't ambulances covered by taxes in America?"
  • "That's a total rip-off."
  • "I think Japan could charge around 100,000 yen for calling an ambulance too."
  • "In Japan it's free even for foreigners, after all."
  • "The base fare alone is $11,670 (about 1.9 million yen) — you've got to laugh, lol."
  • "If you make it fully paid, there's a risk people won't call in a genuine emergency and it becomes too late — so it should be free if the diagnosis is truly urgent, and charged if it turns out it wasn't."
  • "Holding not just people's weaknesses but their very lives hostage to jack prices up without limit — it's an appallingly evil business. Only those with money are saved; those without are left to die. That a nation can leave this be means its politics and society are completely broken."

A Turkish man dies in police custody

A Turkish national held on suspicion of an immigration-law violation complained of stomach pain and died the next day, prompting debate over detention procedures.

Sources: Yahoo! news, 2ch

Comments:

  • "He could've been saved if they'd just deported him."
  • "If he's Turkish, maybe he's a Kurd?"
  • "This is what happens when you don't deport people quickly."
  • "An autopsy that opens up his stomach would tell you the reason."
  • "So he did get examined by a doctor — I wonder if that's really true."
  • "Aren't there way too many of these cases? It's genuinely scary how you never know what's going on."
  • "Because they can't send people back quickly, it ends up bad for both sides."
  • "It's just death from illness, isn't it."

Mexican lawmakers eye an antitrust complaint over Sony's disc exit

After Sony signaled it will end PlayStation disc production by January 2028, Mexican lawmakers were reported to be preparing an antitrust complaint.

Sources: EUROGAMER

Comments:

  • "The PS6 is finished."
  • "The day PlayStation shelves get treated like trash cans isn't far off."
  • "They can still sell download codes, so this is just dumb."
  • "Then Sony will just pull out of that country, no?"
  • "It's just fools who don't even know download codes are sold at retail making a fuss, lol."
  • "By that logic every past console with proprietary media would be caught too. Where's the monopoly in a next-gen console not supporting old media? lol."
  • "In the first place they're only dropping discs — packaged editions continue, so there's no problem."
  • "It literally says retail sales continue even after discs are dropped. How dense are these overseas folks?"