The Kumamoto District Court… ordered the state, the Kumamoto Prefectural Government and Chisso Corp. to pay damages to three of eight unrecognized Minamata disease sufferers …[The] court ordered the payment of ¥106 million in damages, including a record-high ¥100 million for one of the three victims…[However], lawyers for the plaintiffs said they effectively lost because the court rejected damages for five of the eight plaintiffs…The eight are men and women aged 54 to 61 who were born in Kumamoto and neighboring Kagoshima around 1956, when health authorities officially recognized the existence of Minamata disease in Kumamoto Prefecture…The eight, who complain of paresthesia (a “pins and needles” feeling) in their limbs, had applied with two prefectural governments for recognition as Minamata disease patients but were rejected or left in limbo…Their lawyers argued that they had a history of mercury intake and contracted mercury-caused paresthesia. The defendants denied it...