FILE – In this Nov. 18, 2016, file photo, a woman walks past a sumo mural at the Ryogoku Kokugikan, Japan’s national sumo stadium, in Tokyo. A Japanese sumo wrestler died of acute respiratory failure Wednesday, April 28, 2021, after suffering a head injury during his bout in a tournament last month, in a case that brought sumo’s emergency response into question.
TOKYO (AP) — A Japanese sumo wrestler has died a month after falling on his head during a bout in a case that has raised questions about the sport’s response to medical emergencies.
Hibikiryu, 28, died of acute respiratory failure on Wednesday, the Japan Sumo Association said Thursday.
The wrestler, whose real name was Mitsuki Amano, was thrown by his opponent during a bout at a tournament on March 26. Footage of the bout showed he fell on his head hard and lay face down for several minutes while sumo officials watched and waited for paramedics to arrive.
On a stretcher, the wrestler was conscious and told sumo officials that he felt his lower body was paralyzed, but his condition had been improving at the hospital, Nikkan Sports newspaper reported.
Sumo officials told Japanese media it was unknown whether Hibikiryu’s death was related to his injury. There was no immediate comment from his family.
There were no medical experts standing by to give him first-aid treatment, according to Japanese media reports. Wrestlers are customarily expected to get up by themselves, while medical experts are at the tournament site but not standing by near the ringside.
The ancient Japanese sport, which originally was part of a Shinto religious ritual, has faced calls for reforms, including of its emergency medical response and its bans on women entering the ring, which is considered sacred.
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