Japanese companies opening vaccination sites amid slow national rollout

Wow, The inept Government have thrown their hands up as it’s just to difficult to organize using their friends. So companies step in and apparently have it all in hand organized relatively quickly. People should be able to vote companies into government things might actually get done. Of course it’s because they don’t want sick staff and to their benefit to do what the government can not accomplish. What a bizarre world.

Nice work! I have been seeing nothing but upward movement! This is excellent!

Finally, it is not yet the scale necessary but every advancement is welcome, hopefully many more centers will open and the majority of the population will be protected by this year.

A little late but good.

Months back one of the large mobile clinic Companies that service these and other companies offered their services for exactly this and to set up in care homes and parks but was told the government didn't need their services.

I was told directly by one of those in charge of the mobile clinic company.

@olympicsupport most people baint getting your sargasm

Japan is such a fragmented society. The central govt should be the one doing all this, so there is a top-down, strong, efficient and centralized vaccine supply chain instead of various authorities and organizations doing their own things for their own groups of people.

One of the great myths is that the Japanese nation pulls together in a crisis. In fact, it pulls itself apart, as shown in Fukushima, Kobe 1995 and the Olympics.

The beer and whisky maker will start giving out shots from June 21

make mine a double, no ice, no water. thanx....

Some companies hire in-house healthcare professionals, and they practice mass vaccinations for employees ahead of regular flu season. They are familiar with the rollout and thus can act swiftly

Just 8.7% of Japan's population have gotten at least one shot, according to a Reuters tracker, the lowest rate among larger, wealthy economies.

More updates: the total number of people who have received at least one vaccination shot in Japan has surpassed 14m, or 11 per cent of the population. Reuters tracker also slows :)

Haven’t Japanese companies routinely administered seasonal jabs on site using contracted medical staff?

Why this revelation now?

Somethings I will never understand with regards to LDP governance.

Great! The more people getting the vaccines, the sooner we get out of these endless cycles of SoE opens, SoE is extended, SoR closes, SoE opens again, rinse repeat.

I hope more universities get on board too, I read recently there are some unis planning to vaccinate also.

It should be noted that if some employees do not want to get vaccinated, they could be discriminated.

I know some get the flu shot every year just to avoid being seen badly by coworkers

Nice!

If Japan continues to speed up the vaccine roll out, we will soon overtake Australia.

""as the country races to speed up inoculations before the start of the Tokyo Olympics in July.""

Must be kidding me, RACES? what would the pace be if it wasn't racing??

My company give every year free influenza shots to all employees who want to get it.

Nobody is forced to take it.

2 doctors and 2 nurses come for one day to our company, and within 6 or 7 hours, about 1000 employees are vaccined.

The same plan is now coming up for the Covid vaccine in my company.

But it will be probably August.

With a little luck, I can be fully vaccinated in September.

By the way, my parents in law got their first shot yesterday in a hospital in Tokyo.

Things a rolling now!

Nice to see that!

While I agree with Jeff Lee, it should be done by the national government, they have shown themselves time and again to be so inept at getting people vaccinated that any way that they administer the vaccine is best. As someone else said the more that companies vaccinate, then there will be more opportunities for those of us who don't work there to go to the mass vaccination sites and get our jab quickly.

Oxycodin

Once you get your vaccine let let’s hope that it will not affect IQ scores

There is no evidence the vaccine will affect anyone's IQ, please stop spreading false information.

Companies that are still in the planning stage:

Lots of planning going on! Plan away!

Rather than these mass centres, they should distribute the vaccines to all the clinics as soon as possible. There are thousands of them all over Japan and this would mean smaller numbers gathering for their jab which would reduce risks. It’s simply a logistics problem and easily solvable with the right political will.

When the rollout really starts gathering steam and - hopefully (speaking personally; I know that there are posters here who seem to hate Japan so much that they would be swimming in schadenfreude if it went badly) cases drop as more people are vaccinated, it will be industry, not government, which receives the praise and appreciation.

So all my tax money that goes the the Ministry of Health was a waist? Isn’t their one job looking after the health of tax payers? Now when needed it’s companies that take the lead? Something is seriously wrong at the Ministry of Heath and snoozing. Almost like the thousands of paid bureaucrats aren’t actually needed at all.

More proof of an inept, useless government. Where exactly does our tax money go?

I can't help but wonder if it took this long to do this because of money.

Now that the government is paying nearly double to private Vaccine givers is that how it was done

"As the country races ... for the Olympics."

Um, a snail will win this race.

It took them half a year to figure out the more vaccination centers the better. ha

I guess what all this means is that "regulations" (yes, that means you Suga-san, and the rest of the LDP) have been preventing common sense measures all along.

I guess what all this means is that "regulations" (yes, that means you Suga-san, and the rest of the LDP) have been preventing common sense measures all along.

Indeed.

All they needed to do from the beginning was to supply vaccines to an ready efficient vaccination network, one that annually vaccinates up to around 60 million

one that annually vaccinates up to around 60 million

*one that annually vaccinates up to around 60 million for flu alone.

i know a hospital (partners colleague) that had to destroy a number of Pfizer doses because they were out of date last week.

for you optimistically, you need two shots, then it usually takes about for weeks to be fully effective against old strains. That’s about 2-2.5 months if taken today. So basically, after the Olympics.

...but TOC is not in that list.

“To make up for lost time, the government has handed over more control to municipalities and companies to set up their own systems and centers for administering shots.”

Definition of fascism

1

often capitalized  : a political philosophy, movement, or regime (such as that of the Fascisti) that exalts nation and often race above the individual and that stands for a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, severe economic and social regimentation, and forcible suppression of opposition

2

: a tendency toward or actual exercise of strong autocratic or dictatorial control

early instances of army fascismand brutality

— J. W. Aldridge

It should be noted that if some employees do not want to get vaccinated, they could be discriminated.

That's an issue with which we will have to deal alongside the nationwide rollout campaign. Vax side effects (fear) should be handled carefully. At the organizational/community level, it doesn't have to be the case that every one of members must take jabs. Your enhanced immunity by vax will save your neighbors.

But currently the top and most urgent task is to rectify the slow process and unresponsiveness to growing public demands for quick shots (and vax passport?). Many booking lines still almost always remain busy, or slots fully booked up in a moment once opened. Public complaints about it never cease. To date, hesitancy problem is virtually non-existent.

So how will the all process be installed if carried by private companies and not gvt? Employee have to sign a discharge and renounce to any claim in case of side effect before receiving the shot or are they still covered under the Gvt's umbrella and entitled to the same compensation?

Clearly something that couldn't have been done SIX MONTHS AGO OR LONGER.

Private sector to the rescue! I love capitalism!

@Nothernlife

Why the sudden interest in what they do down there?

I was just surprised, I guess it was yesterday, I read that Australia has just 10% of its population vacinated.

According to this article here, Japan has 8.7%.

And Japan is very slow in its vaccine roll out.

I thought Australia is doing everything, according the Covid pandemic, soooo perfect.

But it seems that in vaccination roll out, they are just a few steps ahead of Japan.

Nissan Motor Co

Are they going to blame Ghosn, too, if their plan to vaccinate fails?

I thought Australia is doing everything, according the Covid pandemic, soooo perfect.

But it seems that in vaccination roll out, they are just a few steps ahead of Japan.

Well, Japan claims that they are doing perfectly, too. Note that Japan is the 3rd largest economy.

In contrast, China is vaccinating 17M per day.

To make up for lost time, the government has handed over more control to municipalities and companies 

This.

For most everything.

Central government is simply a useless model for most everything. Perhaps more people will realize it now.

The central govt should be the one doing all this, so there is a top-down, strong, efficient and centralized vaccine supply chain instead of various authorities and organizations doing their own things for their own groups of people.

“Just tell me where in the world you find these angels who are going to organize society for us.” — Milton Friedman

The campaign was slowed initially by scant supplies of imported doses,

Scant supplies of initiative, creativity and common sense.

Absolutely, but before that could happen here , 6 months worth of meetings needed to be held and govt / bureaucracy had to be shown as totally inept first.

For me it's much simpler. Somebody tried to make money off of the vaccinations first. That's why they tried to create another system instead of just using the fully functioning existing one.

They are using that one still concurrently, somebody around here somewhere mentioned a partner receiving a coupon for rubella vaccine or something.

Of course, I have no evidence and no idea how they tried to make money off it or who

I wounder if the goverment is very disaproving of this venture, lets face it, it shows them in a very incompetent light. Either way its a cracking good idea, well done.

government, they have shown themselves time and again to be so inept at getting people vaccinated that any way that they administer the vaccine is best

What should baffle all of us though, is why we would assume central government would or ought be efficient in the first place?

Consider the madness of commuters of going in all sorts of directions during rush hour in a large train station such as Shinjuku, pre-pandemic. Hundreds or thousands of people somehow manage to all get where they need to go efficiently enough without any kind of centralized authority telling them how to go about it.

Decentralized decision making works very well in similar ways in a great manner of areas.

But consider cars on the roads. That doesn’t work well at all without road rules.

Rules.

Making standard rules are one thing that central government excels at (sometimes for the good but sometimes overburdensomely). This is no doubt why government came to be known as “govern”ment in the first instance.

At some point people some decades ago became confused, and thought that not only should we have central government decide rules and laws, we should have it actually run parts of the economy too.

That was a grave mistake, needless to say.

Vaccinations is surely an area where normal decentralized human decision making would have produced better outcomes sooner than the centralized approach has, and I very much welcome the loosening of overburdensome rules and welcoming the ”private sector” (us non-government types) in partaking of the effort - better late than never.

cases drop as more people are vaccinated, it will be industry, not government, which receives the praise and appreciation.

We have to rethink our expectations of government. Voluntary cooperation among humans is the normal state of things - we can buy bread at the supermarket not because of government and the same it is more or less with vaccines.

So all my tax money that goes the the Ministry of Health was a waist?

Absolutely a waste. Japan has a public spending problem, but if each of us were in control of our share of the national budget for health spending, it can be guaranteed that free markets would produce better outcomes than the non-competitive central government bureaucracy approach that we have, and for that we could spend less money too. Singapore’s successful model of individual health savings accounts demonstrates that this is so.

I hope that such realizations are a positive of the coronavirus pandemic.

Why now suddenly a deal?

Let's see:

May 25 2021

https://english.kyodonews.net/news/2021/05/f012ccd20dce-japan-readies-higher-incentives-for-clinics-to-give-covid-19-shots.html

 the government will increase the payments of 2,070 yen ($19) that clinics currently receive for every dose of COVID-19 vaccine they administer to 4,070 yen for facilities that give 100 or more shots per week over a span of four weeks, and to 5,070 yen for those that give 150 or more shots.

I wonder if these companies will get a cut of that now higher payment?

govt / bureaucracy had to be shown as totally inept first.

We do have to recognize though that the people in govt etc are not bad or useless people, by and large and on average they are as good as the rest of us and quite possibly even better.

The problem isn’t the people though, it is simply the system of centralized decision making that is inferior to decentralization. It makes far more sense for each of us to take actions ourselves rather than waiting for decisions to be made by others.

Japan kicked off its inoculation push in mid-February, later than most major economies. 

Addendum, more than most economies, and currently ranks 97th in global vaccination rates.

If Japan continues to speed up the vaccine roll out, we will soon overtake Australia.

And if they go all out , might soon catch up with Laos, Peru, North Macedonia and Kazakstan.

Racing, Japan style. Put your money on Team Japan!

'We do have to recognize though that the people in govt etc are not bad or useless people'

Hahahahaha!! The LDP and in particular Mr.Suga have demonstrated otherwise.

They have done nothing for the good of the community at large, have fumbled and delayed making decisions for the sake of trying to siphon off as much tax money as possible to their 'friends' and personal interests and have proven so inept private companies are being forced to pick up the slack.

Although perhaps I'm being too harsh...Ms.Koike has at least show a flair for holding up placards (career after politics on children's T.V.??)

In 1970 there was a whopping 2 million births in Japan and 700 thousand abortions. That generation knew how to do it, what's changed?

The inept Government have thrown their hands up as it’s just to difficult to organize using their friends

I suspect this was the plan all along.

Only the companies with political connections can get the shots.

For the most of the people, you either have 200,000-300,000 yen lying around to try to buy appointment slots on the black market, or have the time (and money) to travel abroad for the vaccine.

Unless you have very good connections to some doctors, it is difficult to get a spot on their wait list even if you offer 100,000+ yen.

In most respects, Japan is a modern, technologically advanced country. It has sent probes to asteroids, which returned with samples of same. It makes world renowned vehicles and electronics. So why, why, why has Japan been so derelict in making Covid-19 vaccines available to its citizens? It does not make sense to me.

1glennToday  06:25 am JST

So why, why, why has Japan been so derelict in making Covid-19 vaccines available to its citizens? It does not make sense to me.

Make a simple request at work, and see the rigamarole behind the scenes. And sometimes at the front of the scenes.

Interestingly, in elementary schools here, I see good education and good team work, independent thinking, and children able to make decisions without consulting everyone.

I wonder where it all begins.

Good news if you work for a major Japanese company. Not good news if you don't.

If you allow major companies with own medical staff, why not just allow ANY CLINIC or other organization with medical staff to administer the COVID vaccine? Just about every clinic administers flu vaccine here.

Japanese government has essentially admitted that vaccine does not really need to be administered at special gov. organized vaccination facilities.

Amazing (but not out of character) how many barriers the Japanese government sets up for themselves to prevent itself from doing a job. I guess Japanese government wants to give favors to their friends in corporate Japan (at the expense of everyone else's health).

I hope LDP looses decisively in the the next election. Even my friend in LDP in the Diet. Some part of the government needs to be held accountable.