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Japan reports 186,229 coronavirus cases; Tokyo has record high 31,878

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What I don't understand is why the city is suddenly testing enough people for the numbers to be high. During the first two years of the pandemic, it was unusual for Tokyo to test more than 10,000 a day. What changed?

44 ( +54 / -10 )

There are PCR testing sites all over the place

That is exactly the point.

It is not really the cases that increased, it is the tests that increased.

I got 4x tested within the last few weeks, and many of my coworkers too because almost every week we have a positive person here at the company.

The last 2 days we got absolutely no tests, but since a few weeks my company sends everyone immediately to test, as soon as we got in close contact. It is very easy and fast to get tested these days.

The situation of amount of cases was probably same already during the last 2 years, but nobody could clearly understand that, because the amount of daily conducted tests were very low.

16 ( +22 / -6 )

And additional, even assymptomatic people are getting tested.

Me and my coworkers got tested even we were all asymptomatic.

But we came in close contact with positive coworkers who show symptoms.

During the last 2 years asymptomatic got mostly denied for testing.

And even symptomatic people got sometimes denied for testing.

But these days, symptomatic and asymptomatic people can get a test easy and fast.

9 ( +13 / -4 )

@Sven - What do you want to do? For sure we could implement more in the way of suppression tactics such as they are doing over in China at huge economic cost, but what will it ultimately achieve? It is silly to imagine that such measures could eliminate the virus at this stage. In the face of an endemic virus, all it does is spread it out along the time axis - that may be desirable if your healthcare services are facing collapse like in the earlier stages of the pandemic with variants that were much more deadly, but right now, although it is a struggle at these peaks, most healthcare services are just about coping. There is a valid argument there that slowing it down might allow us more time to develop a universal coronavirus vaccine, but that is a big "if" and might be decades away - the global economy would be completely ruined if we were to try to pursue a "China-like" strategy over a long period in the hope that we might be able to develop such a vaccine. There is also the threat of a new more pathogenic variant emerging with the same or higher transmissibility as the current variants - it is not impossible, but so far it seems that the virus has become more transmissible and less pathogenic. A similar thing could happen with any other endemic virus, such as happened with the Spanish flu pandemic - we never had any restrictions or rules in place every winter when flu cases went up - our response should be based on the real virus, not a fantasy one.

9 ( +10 / -1 )

The number of people actually hospitalized is quite small. Of those, I'd be curious to know how many of those are people well into their elderly years, oe who are the rare obese Japanese people.

The obsession with raw positive case numbers is fueling paranoia in a country where the disease doesn't seem to be as deadly as in other countries.

9 ( +11 / -2 )

Stay the course, stay the course. Don't flinch.

As long as Omi keeps his mouth shut accoding another SOE, we should be fine and can enjoy our summer vaccation.

8 ( +15 / -7 )

And last point additional to my upper posts.

According to my company new rule, if you are positive, symptomatic or asymptomatic, you must stay at home 1 week, and after 1 week, before you are allowed to come back to work again, you need a second test to see if you are negative.

And some of my coworkers were still positive after one week.

So maybe they got officialy counted as 2x positive cases, even it is only 1x infection.

I mean I don't know how exactly the positive cases are reported to the government, but it can also be possible that a still positive case is counted double, even it is the same infection.

But one point is clear;

Japan is conducting many more tests now, therefore there are many more cases coming to light.

8 ( +13 / -5 )

Nearly 800k people currently hospitalized

You mean, nearly 800K isolating and recovering at home

7 ( +16 / -9 )

What I don't understand is why the city is suddenly testing enough people for the numbers to be high. 

Within the article, in the second sentence, is a link.

Click it, and you can see the data for today for Tokyo.

Somehow Tokyo tested fewer people than were listed as positive.

Go see for yourself, this ain't BS.

Yesterday (on which today's results are based, and the most recent testing data shown) it says there were 31,017 tests done, but somehow 31,878 positives.

That's a positive rate of (an impossible) 105% !!

7 ( +10 / -3 )

So the highly masked population isn't affecting the spread?

People may be getting other respiratory issues and heatstroke which can be worse than C19 for most of us and children.

So please be careful when deciding to wear a mask in heat or for long duration and think twice if it's necessary for your kids:

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-022-15409-x

6 ( +19 / -13 )

But Japanese people wear masks! How could this happen?

6 ( +13 / -7 )

Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno called for the "need to watch the impact on the medical system with maximum caution,"

3 Years into the pandemic the LDP/Japan Inc. gov has failed to improve working conditions and wages for essential medical personnel. As incomes continue to fall over a wide swath of the working populace.

Instead focusing on wealth transfers to businesses.

This tragic mismanagement trump's any travel restrictions or mask mandates.

5 ( +6 / -1 )

Seriously I don’t think people are actually reading!

15 cases with severe symptoms in Tokyo …yes that’s 15 out of the 32000 positive cases for today and probably hundreds of thousands for the last week or two. I mean seriously wake up! Hysteria blinkers off!

4 ( +12 / -8 )

15 hospitalized with severe symptoms in a city of nearly 15 million people.

4 ( +9 / -5 )

They make it very difficult in my experience to get admitted to the hospital with Covid. The only way you may get admitted, is if your oxygen saturation is below 90% but we know Covid impacts more than just the lungs. I’m sure there are many people who are recovering at home that probably should be in the hospital. There are tons of articles on the internet on people getting denied hospital admission or taking hours to get a hospital to accept them. They really need makeshift wards to host people that need admitted. When I first got Covid I also asked if their hotel option had medical staff and they said no, so I isolated at home.

4 ( +9 / -5 )

Just continue with WFH system. Let people who can WFH do it. Those who want to come to the office should. There's no difference anyway.

4 ( +4 / -0 )

Some years from now rhe covid vaccines will be exposed as the biggest scam to

have ever been perpetrate by a few on the entire world. I took 2 shots last year and

I am not taking any boaster shots and continue with precaution of wearing mask when

out in a crowd and refrain from touching objects when. out and disinfect at every opportunity

and wash hands thoroughly when back home.

The vaccines don't prevent any one from being infected yet it is still called vaccine, to continue with the scam they tell us the so called vaccine help reduce serious cases. Why isn't data correlating number of serious cases to the number vaccines taken to highlight the effectiveness of the vaccine in reducing serious cases.

Next, almost everyone is wearing mask, yet the number of infection is extremely high, is fair to infer

that mask wearing doesn't prevent the spread of the virus and more like the spread is mostly from contact rather than airborne. If it was really mostly through airborne the number of positives would exceed easily

exceed 500K nationwide.

4 ( +10 / -6 )

Just go along with your daily routine, why even keep count anymore, 99.9 % will survive. Open up like the rest of the world.

4 ( +8 / -4 )

Antigenic tests are used now, not only pcr.

3 ( +9 / -6 )

The official Health Authorities rule is to stay 10 days home if symptomatic.

Your company can not change that rule, otherwise it is illegal.

Like you said for symptomatic people.

For asymptomatic people it is 7 days. (1 week).

And if you show symptoms and are positive, of course you are not allowed to come to work.

3 ( +5 / -2 )

From my experience in Nagoya it is going through elementary schools big time.

3 ( +6 / -3 )

Odd that they don’t stress that 99% of the cases are unvaccinated people anymore. That used to be the “go to” narrative.

3 ( +9 / -6 )

Just recovering from BA.5, one characteristic of this one is a sore throat from hell. I had the original Covid in May 2021 (no vaccines available in Japan at that time). Prior immunity has no effect on what's going around now. Neither do 2 Pfizer and 1 Moderna booster. Basically no one has immunity to the variant going around now.

So much for the genius predictions here over the last few days saying this thing has peaked, lol. Ditto for those claiming the numbers are high because of increased testing, that has nothing to do with it. The reason the numbers are high is because, get this, there are way more cases.

It's not rocket science, they're saying this has a R0 of 18.6 which is higher than measles. I don't know if the r0 is actually 18.6 but whatever it is, it's pretty high. Add that to the just observed 3 day weekend of BBQ's and party party, it's not rocket science what's going on.

Basically humankind is going to have to just adapt to COVID by catching it and getting over it, or not.

3 ( +10 / -7 )

drluciferToday  12:56 am JST

Some years from now rhe covid vaccines will be exposed as the biggest scam to have ever been perpetrate by a few on the entire world...

*The vaccines don't prevent any one from being infected yet it is still called vaccine**, to continue with the scam they tell us the so called vaccine help reduce serious cases. *

Vaccines have never prevented anyone getting infected ever regardless of what the virus is. That's not what they are meant to do. Vaccines are meant to assist your body to identify and protect in the event that you are infected.

3 ( +8 / -5 )

MontyToday 06:05 pm JST

And last point additional to my upper posts.

According to my company new rule, if you are positive, symptomatic or asymptomatic, you must stay at home 1 week, and after 1 week, before you are allowed to come back to work again, you need a second test to see if you are negative.

The official Health Authorities rule is to stay 10 days home if symptomatic.

Your company can not change that rule, otherwise it is illegal.

2 ( +7 / -5 )

That's a positive rate of (an impossible) 105% !!

That's because positive results at private test centres are included in the positive case count but the number of tests they run is not included in the testing figures.

2 ( +3 / -1 )

If able to stay isolated and willing to do so then please go ahead.

However, the vast majority cannot and do not.

Yes, there are consequences but that is true of many decisions in life not just Covid…

2 ( +6 / -4 )

Downplaying long Covid is equal to harassment of those suffering from long Covid. If you have never experienced long Covid you cannot understand what it’s like. I’ve had it for many months and seeing lots of improvements after getting on proper medicine. The Japanese department of health recognizes long Covid, so does the WHO and CDC.

1 ( +10 / -9 )

You were mixing both symptomatic and asymptomatic

Ah, ok...I understand what you mean.

After I read my sentence again, yes you are right, what I wrote is a little bit confusing.

Sorry for that.

What I meant is, that after one week, symptomatic and also asymtomatic guys have to make a second test to see if they are now negative.

Because without a negative test, they are not allowed to come back to work.

So if you are still positiv after 7 days, even as an asymptomatic Guy, you are not allowed to come back to work.

So therefore I was assuming, that these 2nd positiv tests can be probably accidentaly counted in the official statistic as a new case even it is the same infection.

I was lucky so far...4x tested, 4x negativ.

1 ( +3 / -2 )

That's because positive results at private test centres are included in the positive case count but the number of tests they run is not included in the testing figures.

So if the official government data they provide for testing is not correct, then how accurate is the case totals numbers? Or how about any of the other data they provide on there about severity, hospital bed usage, outpatient services, etc? Why would one part be more officially accurate and-or reliable than another?

1 ( +2 / -1 )

Apparently,

Either the Pandemic is over - so there's no need to be alarmed, and anyway as this BA.5 variant although more contagious than the former variants, it's also less harmful and generally doesn't result in hospitalization - so why worry about it;

or alternatively, Gaman suru, Ganbatte...

1 ( +3 / -2 )

As this all goes on for longer and longer, there's a line of thought emerging that those with successive inoculations against the Corona virus, could eventually find themselves less immune to something more mundane and die from that.

https://www.healthline.com/health-news/why-a-4th-covid-19-shot-likely-wont-provide-more-protection

https://www.barrons.com/articles/repeat-covid-vaccine-booster-shots-51642026102

etc.

But there are equally, an abundance of counterclaims that suggest, we can go on ad-infinitum as evidence to-date, doesn't suggest any issues.

https://www.who.int/news/item/17-05-2022-interim-statement-on-the-use-of-additional-booster-doses-of-emergency-use-listed-mrna-vaccines-against-covid-19

https://www.ema.europa.eu/en/human-regulatory/overview/public-health-threats/coronavirus-disease-covid-19/treatments-vaccines/vaccines-covid-19/safety-covid-19-vaccines

For me, the WHO's comments suggesting an ongoing series of quarterly boosters, is both worrying and troubling... worrying - since it's a cost that will inevitably have to be borne by the individual - assuming that they can afford it, and troubling, since the longer this goes on, the further we go into the uncharted territory of actually knowing what the long term effects are....

As an extreme example - Thalidomide, where people were told, it's safe, it's good... and the results were less than good.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thalidomide

I hope people will still be allowed to choose without discrimination.

1 ( +4 / -3 )

Thanks, @Zoroto and @didou, for clarifying it for me.

0 ( +5 / -5 )

Of course, not. That would require the government to start paying restaurants again, and this government is already broke with the yen tanking. This decision has nothing to do with anything else.

No it’s because in the reality we live in and not in the distorted one of some fanatics (there are a lot of them coming to JapanToday forum apparently), we are talking about a case fatality rate of 0.2%. No one rational and with a sane mind would block a country and use tax payer money to compensate for it for such a low rate. Money available or not.

0 ( +9 / -9 )

RedstormToday  08:23 pm JST

I don’t know a single person who had covid this year.

I know at least 10, although not in Japan. Omicron ba.5 has changed the game.

0 ( +5 / -5 )

So if the official government data they provide for testing is not correct, then how accurate is the case totals numbers? Or how about any of the other data they provide on there about severity, hospital bed usage, outpatient services, etc? Why would one part be more officially accurate and-or reliable than another?

The data has explanation of what it represents. Its more of a case of monolingual people ignoring the details in the explanations (which are usually only in japanese) and blindly trying to mix data points that don't have a common basis.

0 ( +1 / -1 )

31k out of 14 million. Nothing to panic about.

-1 ( +10 / -11 )

@Monty

I understand the difference. You were mixing both symptomatic and asymptomatic in your sentence. It looked to be the same. The rules anyway are defined by the health authorities, and the company follow that rules

According to my company new rule, if you are positive, symptomatic or asymptomatic, you must stay at home 1 week,

-1 ( +1 / -2 )

Thanks @Algernon LaCroix for clarifying it for me.

-1 ( +2 / -3 )

I don’t get it, not enough people wearing masks maybe?!

-1 ( +6 / -7 )

@ian: I know - Can't win! Fickle old bunch on here.

-2 ( +5 / -7 )

Forgot to report there are only 20people in hospital with severe symptoms! An important statistic which puts this in perspective. 30000 people with a cold is nothing to claim the sky is falling over! Lucky those vaccinations are working so well…..not!

-2 ( +18 / -20 )

NOMINATION Today  07:42 pm JST

Thanks @Algernon LaCroix for clarifying it for me.

Don't thank me, thank science.

-2 ( +2 / -4 )

MontyToday  06:05 pm JST

According to my company new rule, if you are positive, symptomatic or asymptomatic, you must stay at home 1 week, and after 1 week, before you are allowed to come back to work again, you need a second test to see if you are negative.

I imagine they will change that pretty quick Monty as they did in Australia. Reason being people continued to test positive many weeks after! Unless of course they like paying lots of sick leave…

-3 ( +5 / -8 )

BlacklabelToday  08:17 pm JST

Odd that they don’t stress that 99% of the cases are unvaccinated people anymore.

Not sure I remember it like that at any point. There were claims that a high proportion of those with severe symptoms were not fully vaccinated.

-3 ( +2 / -5 )

Very troubling Covid levels will have profound effects of Japan, for years to come, if government inaction persists. Neverending story...

-4 ( +4 / -8 )

If you get corona most insurance policies pay out 10.000~20.000 a day per person as you are classified as an inpatient even though you are at home.

I know numerous families who received upwards of 250,000.

That's the main reason why many people get tested.

-4 ( +2 / -6 )

Get vaccinated, get tested and get over it!

Record high numbers and yet less than 20 in serious enough condition to warrant being in hospital yesterday. We are closing the borders; missing out on millions daily, and bankrupting businesses left right and centre for the sake of 20 people in hospital.

-5 ( +17 / -22 )

What’s with all of the negative comments about masks ? Vaccines ? Those are only a couple of highly effective tools in our toolbox …. This isn’t that difficult people …. If you’re not vaccinated…. Get it started …. If you’re eligible for a booster…. Get it done ! Reduce your chances of getting a severe case and helping the desperately over stressed healthcare system…. Nearly 800k people currently hospitalized…. Whine and spin it all you want …. The jgov considers those in an actual hospital, a hotel, or other facilities as hospitalized! These people are under the care of Drs and nurses around the clock …. These are not people sent home…. Mask up when necessary…. Maybe you or the person next to you is infectious…. Avoid all crowded, closed spaces …. Open doors and windows…. Don’t shy to ask wherever you must visit to ventilate the place …. And opening a door or a window is not ventilated…. Avoid public transportation…. Ride a bike…. If you’re not feeling well…. Sore throat…. Feverish …. Body aches …. Get an appointment for your PCR test asap. It’s not cold nor flu season … assume you have Covid until told otherwise…. If you’re in the marginalized minority of anti everything…. Come join us on the other side… do your individual part!

-5 ( +24 / -29 )

@theResident

I was expecting at least a few would cite the current testing situation as validation of the assertion that strict testing before being partly responsible for low case counts.

Anyway if anyone is so inclined and has the skills maybe they could correlate current and past testing numbers with resulting number of cases together with relative infection rates and other data to come up with an estimate of actual number of cases before testing was liberalized (is my use of the word correct, that's the first time I used it)

-5 ( +1 / -6 )

I as I said after all many people went out and enjoyed and they can rightfully do that, but many people thought it was ok to not protect themselves. This Covid is not going anywhere. I have said it is here to stay its like a flea jumping from one dog to another sucking the blood out of him.

-5 ( +1 / -6 )

More relaxed environment, more traffic criss crossing Japan and it’s borders, more interactions among both vaxxed and unvaxxed population so cases are coming up. That’s my observation. My work place has been more crowded YTD. We still wear masks in public areas like pantry and meeting rooms while most, if not all, is maskless at their personal space. I have not changed any of my common sense when it comes to infection prevention, COVID or not, and I hope I will still be able to avoid it even though I am not vaccinated.

-5 ( +1 / -6 )

Monty

Japan is conducting many more tests now, therefore there are many more cases coming to light.

Are you just assuming ?

Why not back up with some data.

-5 ( +0 / -5 )

OKINAWA numbers are huge again.

This is more of an appropriate measure of the real numbers in Japan.

-7 ( +6 / -13 )

Some years from now rhe covid vaccines will be exposed as the biggest scam to

have ever been perpetrate by a few on the entire world

So, when the evidence contradict what you believe your argument is that everything will be known in the future? that is not an argument, it is more of an excuse.

Next, almost everyone is wearing mask, yet the number of infection is extremely high, is fair to infer

that mask wearing doesn't prevent the spread of the virus and more like the spread is mostly from contact rather than airborne.

Scientific data completely contradicts you, what is happening is a very easy to transmit variant coupled with a huge relaxation of the measures that are necessary. Masks are not supposed to be a standalone measure that work perfectly by themselves but part of a set that is not being enforced anymore.

Contact transmission is not an important way for covid to spread, crowds of people in close proximity, specially in situations where the masks are removed are the hugely more likely explanation.

-7 ( +1 / -8 )

According to the statistics published on the Official Tokyo Website.

Unvaccinated individuals constitute 23% of Tokyo's population but only 18% of the positive cases.

What statistics exactly? depending on the demographics this would be expected. After all, vaccinated and unvaccinated people are not equal, people at higher risk of infection (health care workers, teachers, etc.) are also very frequently vaccinated, while people that are at low risk can, at the same time, feel they need less the vaccine and be isolated (so they get infected less) or asymptomatic (so they are tested less).

-8 ( +8 / -16 )

Vax works so well...

-9 ( +24 / -33 )

It must be time for another Go To campaign.

These extremely high numbers have come straight after Japan lifted all the restrictions, including mandatory masks. Coincidence? I think not! Obviously all the people thought it was ok to go back to pre-pandemic life. Now, they are worse off than ever before. Way to go Japan! The only positive thing is, due to vaccinations fewer people are in intensive care.

-9 ( +0 / -9 )

I have no idea why nobody shows any reactions. Is it a state of uneducated responsibility bearers or only the fatigue due to summer heat? If nothing is done the virus loads again grow exponentially into next and next waves and are given the much higher chance to genetically recombine into more severe variants etc. In addition, the obvious consequences remain, more LongCovid, more distortions in economy and society as well as the lower life expectancy on average. This underestimating and downplaying is becoming a neck breaker, that’s for sure, and all who are still younger should at least ask themselves if they are really not growing into more vulnerable age groups, if they really can stand all of the next waves and if believing their winning streak won’t end is just only tricking themselves.

-12 ( +8 / -20 )

Agree with Sven Asai and Steven. The naysayers seem to think they are invincible, but if you happen to get long COVID (which can happen to anyone regardless of age), there is no downplaying that. We live on a very small island country, with crowded big cities. Let's do the bare minimum (ex: masking indoors) to try to protect ourselves and others, hey?

-12 ( +10 / -22 )

According to the CDC, the new BS5 variant has nano-scale arms that enable the virus to climb out through the sides of masks, and little reptilian demon wings so it can fly through the air and infect anything it comes in contact with. That's the official explanation of why it spreads so fast among highly masked populations such as Japan's.

-13 ( +19 / -32 )

Everybody wants accessible testing what's the matter now?

-13 ( +2 / -15 )

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