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COVID-19 Coronavirus: situation in Japan

One of my students actually went to Okinawa last week... Is it really time to travel to other prefectures? I know the money has to keep flowing but still doesn't feel safe.
 
Preliminary results today are 55 (there's a leak). Could be +/- a few because whoever is leaking to the media before the prefecture announces has been vague in the wording.

So 104.2% with 22 awaiting beds and 55 new cases... We're gonna need a tent hospital soon.
 
One of my students actually went to Okinawa last week... Is it really time to travel to other prefectures? I know the money has to keep flowing but still doesn't feel safe.
Because it was so safe here, with 0 cases for about 2 months, when the domestic travel campaign came out... people flocked here. Our second wave is among us and it's already, within days, too hard to handle.

Our population is only 317,000 in the core city where clusters are happening. So when you speak of Tokyo having 427 cases, it's a very small percent in comparison. Either way, Japan is not doing good and this domestic travel campaign didn't help whatsoever...
 
We're in a bad place here as with the 2nd wave (most likely due to the GoTo campaign), our hospitals are overflooded at a 104.2% occupancy rate for COVID-19 patients and 22 asymptomatic are awaiting a bed. :oops:

Further, one hospital treating a couple of patients got a nurse infected.

How much worse can it get with 71 infections in a day?! (Yesterday)

Still awaiting today's cases... which will most likely be lower, but, I guarantee you we'll see high double digits to triple digits in the coming days as weekends are generally low reporting while weekdays are high.
Actually, it's usually Monday and Tuesday that have usually the lowest number of cases because there's a lag of a day or two between tests and results. So don't be shocked if it's even higher than 71 today.

Tokyo had a record number of new cases today (472) and there seem to have been more ambulance sirens recently where I live (15 min walk from a major hospital).
 
Tokyo had a record number of new cases today (472) and there seem to have been more ambulance sirens recently where I live (15 min walk from a major hospital).
Must be severe cases, such as inability to breathe or a hot enough temperature to melt the brain or something, to use a siren.

They rarely use sirens here (also by a hospital) unless, I presume, it's urgent (like a heart attack or stroke). That's when they flip them on and cut down the middle of the 2 lane road. I've seen plenty pass by with people "working" on patients in the back, but I'd assume it's just routine stuff for a broken arm or a patch to stop some bleeding until it can be stitched by a doc later or something.
 
Japan and its higher standards (Mr Aso's "Model Japan") are nowhere now. Here's an interesting piece on Japan's new reality check; and the question whether the country has reopened its economy prematurely.

"The central government hasn't shown clear guidance and a clear strategy on what to do about COVID-19, and is pushing the responsibility to the local government," said Haruka Sakamoto, a public health researcher at the University of Tokyo. "In ordinary times, the government is very centralized, and usually prefectures don't have strong opinions."

Isn't that exactly what's happened in the US?


And on the lighter side of the news: geisha and maiko apprentices have bee furnished with transparent fans. They might work for language teachers, too.

maiko-mask.jpg

Photo credit: Mainichi

 
Doctor "may be in a critical situation in the future"

Regarding the spread of new coronavirus infection in Okinawa Prefecture, Dr. Yoshihiro Takayama of Okinawa Prefectural Chubu Hospital, who specializes in infectious diseases, said, ``Because the epidemic is occurring rapidly, it is difficult to open new beds. Although it is a situation, it is still possible to deal with it by urgently securing a hotel, etc. for medical treatment of mildly ill patients.However, if the infection spreads to the elderly in the future, there will be a lack of beds and there is a danger of becoming a critical situation.
 
Doctor "may be in a critical situation in the future"

Regarding the spread of new coronavirus infection in Okinawa Prefecture, Dr. Yoshihiro Takayama of Okinawa Prefectural Chubu Hospital, who specializes in infectious diseases, said, ``Because the epidemic is occurring rapidly, it is difficult to open new beds. Although it is a situation, it is still possible to deal with it by urgently securing a hotel, etc. for medical treatment of mildly ill patients.However, if the infection spreads to the elderly in the future, there will be a lack of beds and there is a danger of becoming a critical situation.
Given how many months they have had I am sure they have made contingency plans to rapidly expand the medical facilities if needed. :rolleyes:
 
Given how many months they have had I am sure they have made contingency plans to rapidly expand the medical facilities if needed. :rolleyes:


Yes, I agree with you. Okinawa needs tourism and the military spending off base currently is at an all time low. Some areas according to reports there are like dead zones also.
 
The military is under-reporting cases in Okinawa. So far, they're at 263 reported cases.

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So can we safely assume that it's between 800-1000, or about 1.3% of the total personnel assigned here, or worse, 3.3% of our force?
 
This is a post made by MCIPAC on Facebook. It looks like a serious mistake of posting that as they admitted to grossly underestimating figures in Okinawa. I don't know the main units in Mainland or how they're reporting there, but if MCIPAC is doing it, I wouldn't put it past III MEF or even USFJ to do the same.
 
It's not looking good for Okinawa at all... Not only are we at 146% hospital occupancy, but, we're also waiting for some sort of facility to handle the additional 211 with no-to-mild symptoms; talks about hotels opening their doors for them are in the works is what I've been reading.

Not to mention, Okinawa Prefecture is now the highest per capita of COVID-19 infections.

On top of that, preliminary reports point to 80 new COVID-19 infections in Okinawa today.

This is a disaster unfolding! I hope our mortality rate remains low. :(

All I can do is thank the GoJ for introducing the Go To campaign which gave people the mentality that it's safe here, as we had 0 infections for 2 months, so people flocked here, probably asymptomatic... now it's on the loose and out of control.
 
A little update on what's been happening this week. First, the case numbers in Tokyo:

DayNumber of cases
Mon, 3 Aug​
258​
Tue, 4 Aug​
309​
Wed, 5 Aug​
263​
Thu, 6 Aug​
360​
Fri, 7 Aug​
462​

Sources:


Other prefectures have seen an increase in cases, too: yesterday Osaka reported 225 cases, Kanagawa 119, and Chiba 76.

Yesterday, Aichi declared an SOE that will last until 24 August, residents are asked not to cross prefectural borders unless essential. The prefecture of Okinawa declared an SOE last Saturday.

Despite rising numbers in reported infections, Japan allegedly sees fewer hospital deaths related to COVID-19.


This week, the usually very level-headed governor of Osaka, Yoshimura Hirofumi, pulled a veritable Trumpesque, declaring that, based on a very limited study, gargle medicine can reduce the number of those testing positive:

Based on limited trial on a group of 41 patients with mild symptoms, gargling with diluted povidone-iodine four times a day reduced the number of those testing positive to 9.5 per cent after four days, compared with 40 per cent for a group who gargled with just water, Gov. Hirofumi Yoshimura said at a press briefing on Tuesday. Povidone-iodine is an antiseptic more commonly known as betadine. In Japan, it's sold as gargle medicine by Shionogi & Co, using the name Isojin under license from Mundipharma, as well as by Meiji Holdings Co. Meiji, which did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Bloomberg News, saw its shares surging as much as 7.7 per cent in Tokyo following the news. Shionogi rose as much as 3.6 per cent.


As a result, consumers in Osaka emptied the shelves of Isojin in a matter of hours. I wonder if Mr Yoshimura has any vested business interests. :rolleyes:


Lo and behold, the test centres in the Tokyo metropolitan area have made a great technological leap forward: they have replaced their fax machines with digital data transfer via [gasp] COMPUTERS. 😱

 
100 cases in Okinawa today and we have a population of 1.4 million :(
That's about the population of my county. We also have about 100 cases/day. But I'm guessing it might be worse in Okinawa because we don't restrict testing here. So probably many of the cases are not very sick people. Our worst was 345 in one day back in April. Right now we average 0.75 deaths/day. Worst it got was 27/day in April.
 
A little update on what's been happening this week. First, the case numbers in Tokyo:

DayNumber of cases
Mon, 3 Aug​
258​
Tue, 4 Aug​
309​
Wed, 5 Aug​
263​
Thu, 6 Aug​
360​
Fri, 7 Aug​
462​

Sources:


Other prefectures have seen an increase in cases, too: yesterday Osaka reported 225 cases, Kanagawa 119, and Chiba 76.

Yesterday, Aichi declared an SOE that will last until 24 August, residents are asked not to cross prefectural borders unless essential. The prefecture of Okinawa declared an SOE last Saturday.

Despite rising numbers in reported infections, Japan allegedly sees fewer hospital deaths related to COVID-19.


This week, the usually very level-headed governor of Osaka, Yoshimura Hirofumi, pulled a veritable Trumpesque, declaring that, based on a very limited study, gargle medicine can reduce the number of those testing positive:




As a result, consumers in Osaka emptied the shelves of Isojin in a matter of hours. I wonder if Mr Yoshimura has any vested business interests. :rolleyes:


Lo and behold, the test centres in the Tokyo metropolitan area have made a great technological leap forward: they have replaced their fax machines with digital data transfer via [gasp] COMPUTERS. 😱

So what do you guys think will happen to Japan as far as the coronavirus will go
 
So what do you guys think will happen to Japan as far as the coronavirus will go

Hard to predict, but it looks as if the virus will not simply "go away". I expect the current situation to prevail for most of the next year with daily numbers hovering around the current levels or slightly above. Eventually, there will be some treatment and vaccines but no silver bullet. I am not an epidemiologist, but with an ever-mutating virus, it will be difficult to attain herd immunity.
 

"The coronavirus that causes COVID-19 has sickened more than 16.5 million people across six continents. It is raging in countries that never contained the virus. It is resurging in many of the ones that did. If there was ever a time when this coronavirus could be contained, it has probably passed. One outcome is now looking almost certain: This virus is never going away."
 
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