Japan is ready for emergency while Covid-19 cases rise

Japan is ready for emergency while Covid-19 cases rise

by

Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga said at a New Year’s press conference on Monday that an emergency declaration was being considered and that would apply to Tokyo and the three neighboring prefectures of Chiba, Saitama and Kanagawa. The governors of all four regions urged Suga to do so already, as the number of cases increases.

“If necessary, we will not hesitate to send the medical staff of the Self Defense Force,” Suga added, saying the government will support medical facilities to ensure they are not overwhelmed.

Suga did not say when the government will decide whether restrictions can be imposed. Japan’s first state of emergency, declared relatively early in the pandemic last year, lasted more than a month and closed schools and non-essential enterprises.

Japanese authorities are currently limited in their powers to punish those who violate the restrictions, even in an emergency, something that Suga’s government allegedly intends to change to enable local governments to enforce compliance.
The prime minister, who took office in September last year following the resignation of Shinzo Abe, has seen his approval rating drop in recent weeks, in part due to the handling of the pandemic.

On Sunday, Japan recorded 3,150 new cases and 51 deaths, bringing the national total to 244,559, with more than 3,612 deaths. The greater Tokyo region was hit one of the worst, with 816 new cases Sunday after setting a new one-day record of 1,337 last Thursday.

Japan last week confirmed its first cases of the new, possibly more contagious British coronavirus variant, which has called on the government to ban all foreign travelers from entering the country.
Cases across the country have been increasing over the past few weeks, thanks in part to cold winter weather and social exhaustion.

Japan was one of the first countries to be hit by the pandemic, but the government was able to keep affairs at bay by imposing strict border controls, investing their efforts to locate contact and pressuring its citizens to do so. . The efforts were largely successful, and Japan was able to avoid such strict closures in other parts of the world.

Japanese health officials have constantly urged citizens to reduce their daily activities, be vigilant and eat only in small numbers, but this no longer seems to be enough to prevent the spread of the pandemic.

“Japan’s response is too slow and confusing, reflecting a lack of leadership and strategy. On the one hand, they have encouraged domestic travel and dining, on the other hand, they have asked people to be careful,” said Kenji Shibuya, director of the Institute of Population Health at King’s College London. “The government basically asks people to act voluntarily, but does no more than that.”

Suga turned down calls to declare a state of emergency in November, citing advice from an advisory panel that hospitals were still relatively empty. However, the total number of cases in Japan has more than doubled since then.
Japanese officials are believed to be cautious about imposing a lockout or other emergency measures for fear of harming the economy. The country is also once again facing difficult decisions around the Olympics, which were to take place last summer but were eventually postponed as the pandemic spread around the world.
According to the International Olympic Committee, the Tokyo Games will be held from July 23 to August 8, according to the International Olympic Committee, with a rounded-off opening and closing ceremony in line with an ‘overall simplification of the Games’.

In the spring, it must be stated whether and how many foreign spectators will be able to attend the Olympic Games.

A successful Olympics is likely to depend on how quickly vaccination schemes can be instituted worldwide, not least in Japan itself. Vaccination programs should only start in Japan at the end of February, far behind some other countries. Suga told a news conference on Monday that frontline medical workers and the elderly would be the first groups to receive the vaccinations, adding that the government had moved the timeline forward due to the latest outbreak.
However, the Japanese authorities will also have to deal with the expected antipathy against the chance to get the chance: Japan is, according to a recent study by The Lancet, ‘one of the countries with the lowest vaccine confidence in the world’.

Suga promised to “take the initiative” in the vaccination, and said on Monday that a successful Olympics would serve as proof that humans had overcome the coronavirus. ‘

Junko Ogura reports from Tokyo, Japan, reports James Griffiths from Hong Kong. CNN’s Joshua Berlinger and Selina Wang reported.

.Source