COVID-19 Coronavirus: situation in Japan

thomas said:

Yesterday, it was reported that another strain of the coronavirus had been detected in four individuals that arrived in Haneda from Brazil. That strain is different from the British and South African variant. However, it is not clear yet whether it is more infectious.

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News on Japan, Business News, Opinion, Sports, Entertainment and More

www.japantimes.co.jp

Meanwhile, the Japanese government has decided to extend the SoE to Osaka, Kyoto, Hyogo, Aichi, and Gifu prefectures. PM Suga will make a declaration tomorrow.

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News on Japan, Business News, Opinion, Sports, Entertainment and More

www.japantimes.co.jp

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For Japanese and resident foreigners who are allowed to enter, Yasutoshi Nishimura, minister in charge of the country's coronavirus response, said it will require them to sign a pledge upon arrival to stay in quarantine for 14 days, and violating it would result in penalties, such as disclosing the names of violators.

In addition, foreign residents who breach the 14-day quarantine rule will have their resident status revoked and be subject to deportation, Nishimura said at a separate press conference.

He said the new measures will be taken from Thursday because of a recent case where a man who returned from Britain dined with multiple people during his 14-day self-isolation period and caused the spread of a new strain of the virus.

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thomas said:

They forgot to mention that the returnee from the UK spreading the new strain was a Japanese national.

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Fines of up to 500,000 yen ($4,800) against noncompliant companies and criminal penalties for defiant patients are the main features of revision bills that are heading to the Diet to fight the novel coronavirus. Lawmakers of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party and its coalition partner, Komeito, on Jan. 18 gave the nod to the government bills, which would strengthen restrictions on private rights. The legislation will be submitted to the Diet after gaining Cabinet approval this week. In his policy speech the same day in the Diet, Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga said the bills will enhance the effectiveness of two existing laws: the special measures law to deal with the COVID-19 pandemic and the Infectious Disease Law. The government seeks to enact the amended laws in early February to give authorities more power to ensure businesses and infected patients cooperate in efforts to bring the spreading virus under control. The existing laws do not contain any penalties for refusals to cooperate with requests for cooperation. The revision of the special measures law centers on introducing a maximum administrative penalty of 500,000 yen against businesses that do not comply with orders to close or shorten operating hours under a state of emergency issued by the central government. The revision would also allow prefectural governors to exercise the authority to effectively order restaurants and other establishments to change their operating hours.

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Lothor said:

I'm not commenting on rights and wrongs of this, but, interestingly, there are two stories today on the Japan Times website about people breaking ranks and ignoring the state of emergency.

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thomas said:

I remember someone on the news saying that if the fat LDP cats disregard the coronavirus and have steak dinners, why should we the people care.

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"The vaccinations will start with medical professionals, older people and those with underlying medical conditions," Suga said. {...} The government has said Japan will receive an additional supply of COVID-19 vaccine doses for 12 million people from Pfizer, with the U.S. pharmaceutical giant's vaccine likely to gain approval for use in mid-February. Under the latest agreement, Japan has secured doses for a total of 72 million people, more than half of its population of 126 million, from Pfizer within this year, after agreeing last year to buy 120 million doses for 60 million people from the company.

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musicisgood said:

a
Any one here not in favor of taking the vaccine ?

I've never had the flu, so I'm a bit puzzled why I should be forced to take such an experimental type of vaccine that actually only minimizes the the effect of the flu on a persons health. Does it stop you from getting the flu/corona virus. Well, my understanding is that is does not.

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Davey said:

Well I have my doubts as well and if it's offered to me now I think I would decline as I don't feel it's not that much needed in comparison to other people in the world and we don't really know if it works nor the (future) side affects. Etc.

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thomas said:

Invest 11 minutes in the video below and learn why vaccines help. I will be glad to roll up my sleeves for inoculation as soon as it's my turn.

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musicisgood said:

Good video. But the corona vaccine just doesn't across as something I want to shot into my body.

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thomas said:

You have to watch all of the video, they explain why you should.

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musicisgood said:

I've taken all the children's vaccines, just the corona vaccine is something I'm currently not interested in.

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musicisgood said:

Any one here not in favor of taking the vaccine ?

I've never had the flu, so I'm a bit puzzled why I should be forced to take such an experimental type of vaccine that actually only minimizes the the effect of the flu on a persons health. Does it stop you from getting the flu/corona virus. Well, my understanding is that is does not.

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The survey showed Tokyo had the most infected people waiting to be hospitalized or accommodated at other facilities among the 11 prefectures, jumping 4.8 times from 1,563 as of Dec. 19 to 7,539. Meanwhile, the western prefecture of Hyogo has seen its number increase 5.8 times to 727 people. Every prefecture has seen a similar rise. Two of Tokyo's neighbouring prefectures -- Saitama and Chiba -- had 1,169 and 2,328, respectively, while there were 1,410 in the western prefecture of Osaka. Some local governments have determined the numbers of those who need to be hospitalized but are forced to stay at home because of a bed shortage, with 96 such cases in Kanagawa Prefecture, near Tokyo, and 20 such cases in the central prefecture of Aichi.

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"Japan looks to be quite late in the game," Rasmus Bech Hansen, the founder of British research firm Airfinity, told Reuters. "They're dependent on importing many (vaccines) from the U.S. And at the moment, it doesn't seem very likely they will get very large quantities of, for instance, the Pfizer vaccine." Hansen said Japan will not reach a 75% inoculation rate, a benchmark for herd immunity, until around October, about two months after the close of the Summer Games.

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Seventy-five people who died outside of medical facilities from Jan. 1 to Jan. 20 were infected with the novel coronavirus, including many believed to have been recuperating at home, the National Police Agency confirmed. The number of such deaths has increased this month, the NPA said. According to the NPA, 71 people were found dead at their homes, an elderly care facility, an accommodation centre, among other places. Four of them died after they went outdoors. Twenty-seven had tested positive for the novel coronavirus before their deaths, while the other 48 were confirmed infected after police carried out PCR tests on their bodies.

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For the stricter measure scenario, meanwhile, the indicator to lift the state of emergency was set at "100 new cases per day," and Nishiura calculated with the assumption that the declaration continued even if the daily cases dropped below 500. In this case, the number of daily infections falls to fewer than 100 on Feb. 25 and would not get back to the pre-state of the emergency level until mid-July.

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