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Gov't panel, responding to criticism, says cruise ship not designed to be hospital

93 Comments
By MARI YAMAGUCHI

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So, this was a really big screw up by the people in charge. I only wish we could expect them to learn from this experience but I don't think it is going to happen.

24 ( +26 / -2 )

Damage control, but too late, own up to the mess you created. #wrongpeopleincharge

23 ( +29 / -6 )

Bureaucrats not designed to be doctors.

23 ( +24 / -1 )

Here we go again! The more you squeal the harder it gets to believe anything you say going forward!

20 ( +23 / -3 )

Government will never admit to mistakes in governing their populace.

A death here or there is not even a radar blip.

When thousands of people stop going to work?

That would be a concern...

20 ( +22 / -2 )

ships are more like Petri dishes, don’t need a panel of experts to figure that one out

19 ( +21 / -2 )

In Japan, a former passenger in her 60s who tested negative days before getting off the ship then tested positive after taking a train home. Experts said it was unfortunate but within their expectations.

Japanese “experts” said this. Odd how they don’t seem to head the warnings from non-Japanese experts like those in Australia and the US. (Odd meaning “cant have foreigners telling us Japanese what to do.”)

At least 18 American and several Australian former passengers have tested positive after returning home.

These people were repatriated after the initial quarantine on the ship and then quarantined for a further 14 days.

19 ( +22 / -3 )

Absolutely disgusting. The japanese people should be ashamed of their government.

So, in effect they are saying is: We knew Covid-19 was already spreading in the community, so what was the point of bothering to properly quarantine people on the ship.

After this crisis has subsided there needs to be an independent criminal enquiry into its handling, and Abe, Kato, Koizumi, and indeed the entire cabinet and LDP must resign in mass.

And by the way, the Olympics are doomed.

19 ( +23 / -4 )

3,700 passengers and crew on the ship in what they called a botched quarantine, he said it was not feasible to test and relocate all of them for quarantine elsewhere.

@ burning bush, read the quote from the story above ^. There are other gems quoted in the story too...

I'm not sure if you're just trolling (assuming you've read the story, and you're not ignorant of the facts) , to me when a government official admits it can't deal with 3,700 (in a country of 127 millions), that government official is admitting the government/country is unprepared for the scenario, and that it's now only 'rationalizing' the dreadful outcome of this botched quarantine.

This ought to make the IOC anxious about the coming games, and I would not be surprised if they postpone the games.

19 ( +21 / -2 )

Sadly idiots all round & they still don't realise it!

18 ( +21 / -3 )

a botched quarantine, he said it was not feasible to test and relocate all of them for quarantine elsewhere.

Was it not feasible to relocate some of them for quarantine elsewhere?

17 ( +19 / -2 )

Omi, a public health expert who heads the Japan Community Health Care Organization, said it was the best they could do.

If that is the best they can do and after almost 2 months since the outbreak neither produced a protocol about how to deal with an outbreak of an infectious disease and "there [is] no medical facility large enough to admit more than 3,000 people at once" (Health Minister Kato) the Olympic Committee should cancel the Olympics in this 38 million Megalopolis immediately. Japan has neither the competence, nor the capacity, nor the facilities, nor the number of qualified personnel (incl. doctors and nurses who mostly don't speak English) to manage an international event of this scale.

17 ( +18 / -1 )

This is what happens when you appoint someone head of a Ministry without the proper qualifications.

16 ( +18 / -2 )

The officials said Japanese health authorities faced tough challenges in dealing with a foreign-operated ship that required international negotiations in the absence of established rules in such a crisis.

This is what happens when you have monocultural, xenophobic bureaucrats running an international show. FAIL!

16 ( +19 / -3 )

Only 12 new cases in the whole country on Monday.

That we know of. See the logic failure in assuming that the 12 reported cases are the only cases?

14 ( +20 / -6 )

There is a “small possibility” of scattered cases that will create small clusters in communities after passengers return, said Norio Ohmagari, an infectious diseases expert at the National Center for Global Health and Medicine. "So I'd like to call upon all the travelers who disembarked from the ship ... to report to the authorities as soon as possible" if they develop any symptoms, he said. “By doing that, we can prevent another cluster from happening.”

one paragraph summing up incompetence, deception, avoiding responsibility and lack of empathy for the general populace by one of the many good for nothing connected bureaucrat.

14 ( +15 / -1 )

These people were repatriated after the initial quarantine on the ship and then quarantined for a further 14 days.

Spot on! It means the quarantine was ineffective from start to finish, AND after as well. What ever the excuses that comes out of government officials, the outcome is, lots of people got sick, and they could have went on to infect even more people if not for competent governments outside Japan that properly instituted testing AND quarantine outside Japan.

This sordid tale has done untold damage to Japan's reputation. They don't even have control of the narrative either.

13 ( +15 / -2 )

This just in: a ship is not a hospital.

12 ( +14 / -2 )

Always been suspicious of "Expert Government Pannels" seems I was right to be. It would seem common sence does not have a place on a "Pannel" not like, anyone is responsible at all for their decisions. Who's up for some golf?...that caddy isn't wearing a mask? Chastise him.

10 ( +11 / -1 )

Incompetence by any other name is just as incompetent

9 ( +12 / -3 )

The purpose of the quarantine was to protect Japan not to protect the people on the Ship.

and yet still failed again

8 ( +11 / -3 )

"The officials said Japanese health authorities faced tough challenges in dealing with a foreign-operated ship that required international negotiations in the absence of established rules in such a crisis."

Whoa whoa whoa... but I thought they did absolutely nothing wrong.

MikaTakara: "America only has to handle 18 cases, Japan had to handle 600"

Japan has to handle that many cases because they think a rope separating the infected from uninfected will actually stop the virus from spreading, and now they are seeing the results. It's funny how you guys say Japan has such a low rate and did everything perfect, that the quarantine did not fail, then turn around and point out how Japan has to deal with so many more cases than other countries, that it's not Japan's fault they released people into the public without testing, let them take public transport, etc. Get it through your head: no one is blaming YOU, Mika, and you should not take any criticism of the government's extremely poor handling personally. But your denial of it and finger pointing at people OTHER than your own government is exactly part of the reason why they are now in hot water, and the virus as rampant as it is, and for THAT YOU do personally take blame. If the blind defenders of the government on this actually helped hold them to task we could take effective measures. But nope, better I guess to make excuses tomorrow and live in denial, I guess.

8 ( +12 / -4 )

But if you look at the success of the ship's quarantine, many good decisions were made too.

Where's the success? 20% infected and counting is not a success relative to any other nation, including Wuhan, China.

8 ( +9 / -1 )

MikaTakaraToday  09:03 am JST

That we know of. See the logic failure in assuming that the 12 reported cases are the only cases?

Japan reported 12 cases

Korea reported 231 on same day

Italy reported 27 cases on the same day

Those are facts.

It looks Japan is doing a good controlling the spread.

Number of deaths

Japan 3

Korea 8

Italy 7

It looks like Japan is also doing a better job taking care of those who get infected.

Back to you

The difference is that the Italian government acted very diligently,they quarantined all the area in the north east part of the country,stopping every public activity and cultural and sports event,even closing churches and museums.

And this was decided in less than 3 hours from the outbreak.

We can believe and trust the Italian government in numbers,not so much the Japanese.

6 ( +11 / -5 )

instead of joining the hysteria on the internet that isn't based in scientific fact.

Have you spoken to anyone? Pot kettle bkack to me...

Commentaries from experts around the globe says the Japanese quarantine was botched. Commentary from Japan's own expert, who inspected the ship said it was botched.

Easy enough to compare...USA evac and quarantine 2 full plane loads, no increase infection from the start of the evac process.

Australia 3 plane loads...

No one else but the Japanese ended up infecting 20% of the population.

Seems to me like the pro-government crowd has a new slogan "not perfect makes up for everything".

6 ( +8 / -2 )

Mika takara

Japan reported 12 cases

Korea reported 231 on same day

Italy reported 27 cases on the same day

Those are facts.

It looks Japan is doing a good controlling the spread.

Number of deaths

Japan 3

Korea 8

Italy 7

It looks like Japan is also doing a better job taking care of those who get infected.

It is common sense that the numbers are low because test are few, even if you suspect you have it, if you weren't in contact with an infected person, travelled to wuhan or Hebei province or had contact with someone from the above places you will not qualify for testing.

Wuhan started with just a few cases, look at the outcome, to their defense, it started there and they knew little that cannot be said of Japan or other countries.

The rapid increase in South Korea has surfaced because 4800 test a day are carried out and made public.

Refusing to test for fear that cases will be discovered bringing the performance of authorities into question. Is just like you suspecting you have a certain disease but being in denial and telling youself you are okay as you have not done any test.

6 ( +11 / -5 )

Ok...I will agree the cruise ship is by all means not designed to be a hospital and certainly not designed to isolate these cases.

I will also agree that it is very difficult to deal with 3,500 people (several evacuation/isolation centers are needed) as someone has stated above. I agree with that but something could be done (or tried).

I would not want to be in the position of those having to make these decisions......however....

However, the thing that I tipped me off to the fact they do not know what they are doing is they let people use public transportation to return home and then told them to self quarantine as if the virus would wait to become contagious before they arrive home.

If the people in charge would at least concede the facts where the were wrong and could have done better then I would listen to them. At this point I have stopped listening to and trusting those in charge of this in Japan.

6 ( +7 / -1 )

If they had initially tested everybody on the ship and released those that were negative the situation won't have gotten so dire. It wasn't only Japan that had to deal with a cruise ship, Hongkong also had one, the difference is a small country Hongkong duelly tested 1800 in a day whereas Japan has been unable to test 3700 in 3 weeks.

There is just no defense and no spin the ineptude is evident even to a kid. One lesson to learn if you haven't learned before never believe a word of what bereaucrats, politicians, people in authority say.

5 ( +8 / -3 )

"The ship was not designed to be a hospital. The ship was a ship."

Seriously, are my tax dollars being used to pay this guy a salary. I want my money back!

"The sight of them traveling on bullet trains and buses with other people was viewed as an alarming sign of a Japanese lack of sense of a crisis."

Duh?! And a lack of common sense there on the end should be added.

"So I'd like to call upon all of the travelers who disembarked from the ship .... to report to the authorities as soon as possible" if they develop any symptoms, he said. "By doing that, we can prevent another cluster from happening."

Are you friggin' kidding?! Are you really making such an announcement now? I'm wondering how many people could be infected by a single carrier of the coronavirus on a crowded train or bus. A cluster? No, more like an epidemic.

What a bunch of fools!

5 ( +9 / -4 )

Cambodia could have managed the crisis more competently

5 ( +9 / -4 )

But if you look at the success of the ship's quarantine, many good decisions were made too.

What are the success?

Could you kindly educate me.

5 ( +6 / -1 )

The west is joke. Itlay has more cases and more deaths! Those are the facts!!!

Doing more test and discovering more cases and taking action is better than being scared of the unknown and not carrying out test.

5 ( +7 / -2 )

Speaking of experts: Where is Dr. Kentaro Iwata, probably one of Japan's foremost experts with experience in the field (Ebola in central Africa and SARS in China). Not just a bureaucrat promoted through the ranks. Is he part of the task force or advising the government by remote (Teleconference) during self-isolation. Have not heard of him since the FPC. Just asking.

5 ( +6 / -1 )

They screwed up and are offering a meely mouthed reply. Nothing new here folks. Moving on...

4 ( +7 / -3 )

This ship was based in Japan. over half the passengers were Japanese. Did you see them walk out of the ship and ride the trains from Yokohama station?

Where would you send the ship? UK , USA, France, majority of the passengers were Japanese Nationals......

If J. Government didn't want to use their resources, 1 week before the ship docked in Yokohama, contact all the countries to take their passenger when ship docked day 1, why wait 2 weeks, and infect many of the foreign passengers,

For Japanese nationals, why not house them for 14 days on isolation. Instead of keeping them inside the ship.

4 ( +5 / -1 )

As much as I detest stating this...Brace yourselves its going to be a rough bumpy ride all courtesy of your friendly GOJ. IOC...its time to consider throwing in the towel. To everyone here and out there - keep safe and salubrious!

4 ( +6 / -2 )

Unless you think "effective" means "100% perfect"

It's easy to define effective.

Effective means comparable performance to 'competent' peers. The performance and outcome of this quarantine is dreadful. 4 unnecessary deaths, totally preventable. No other nation can match this.

AND, its a gift that keeps giving, not satisfied they've damaged their own reputation, now they're damaging Japan's reputation with ridiculous excuses, day after day.

Other nations would simply say:

The outcome and performance is unacceptable, and a full investigation will be held to avoid repeat and better prepare for the future, PR101. Instead we got the 'samurai' edict, FIGJAM.

4 ( +5 / -1 )

and Japan did not do any testing and the results were not made public? Question :how did you hear about the positive test results from the ship? The tooth fairy?

Can you kindly show where I claimed Japan didn't do Any test.

4 ( +6 / -2 )

It was a farce. The fact that 6 government officials who KNEW they were heading into a contaminated environment, and had access to protective clothing etc got infected, tells you a lot about how this was managed.

4 ( +4 / -0 )

was viewed as an alarming sign of a Japanese lack of a sense of crisis.

I can only view it as how hysterical people can induce the government to make bad decisions. There never was any stopping the virus. So it seems to me the government was trying to make it look like they were doing something to help, and just keeping passengers on the ship seemed the easiest way to do that.

but defended Japan's decision to release about 1,000 passengers after 14 days.

An excellent defense since people are so confused about all this they can't even realize the problem is that they never should have used the ship as a quarantine in the first place.

I still argue no formal quarantine was actually even necessary, but if they had one it should have been on dry land and at various properly equipped facilities. Oh, but how the doomsday people would have screamed though. They still think shutting down the entire city of Wuhan was a great idea. They think we are dealing with the Black Plague still.

3 ( +4 / -1 )

MikaTakaraToday  09:03 am JST

That we know of. See the logic failure in assuming that the 12 reported cases are the only cases?

Japan reported 12 cases

Korea reported 231 on same day

Italy reported 27 cases on the same day

Those are facts.

It looks Japan is doing a good controlling the spread.

Number of deaths

Japan 3

Korea 8

Italy 7

It looks like Japan is also doing a better job taking care of those who get infected.

Back to you

MikaTakaraToday; If you look at it percentage wise, Korea is doing the best and Japan the worst.

3 ( +9 / -6 )

If they admit the cruise ship is not a hospital and inadequate for controlling infected patients... why did they keep them there? Get them to a hospital on land seems like the best solution no? Yet now they claim no responsibility because the ship is not a hospital.

Are they aware that they are making themselves look like idiots?

3 ( +7 / -4 )

You have a solid point Marcelito.

marcelitoToday  10:46 am JST

Japan reported 12 cases

Korea reported 231 on same day

Italy reported 27 cases on the same day

Those are facts.

It looks Japan is doing a good controlling the spread.

Well, as usual you,re not speakingwisdom much under another new name here.....

Japan is doing a good job controlling the spread?...yeah, ok..you mean like releasing 23 passengers from the ship without being tested prior to release?....or like letting the passengers take public transport home, like the infected obaachan from Tochigi spreading the virus on public transport? Great job indeed, your LDP bosses are super efficient at crisis management ( or really its just media managment , no one without rocks in their head believes that there are only 160 odd non ship cases in Japan ). Back to you our always namechanging friend

>

3 ( +5 / -2 )

Many people forgot an important point. If the Japanese government hadn't approve berthing of the cruise ship, situation would have become much worse.  And if the Japanese government had approved landing of the passengers easily like an Italian cruise ship, situation would have become much more terrible. Although some treatments might not be appropriate, the above points should be considered.

3 ( +5 / -2 )

Depends on how bad the situation was when it showed up on Japan's doorstep.

Did they assess how bad the situation was before making the decision?

3 ( +3 / -0 )

It is common sense that the numbers are low because test are few, even if you suspect you have it,

By not testing everyone, the numbers will be low. It was to protect the image of Japan.

3 ( +4 / -1 )

I'll bet if they had relocated half of the passengers in the inner cabins and provided infection control training to the crew the outcome would have been much better. It will be very interesting to see which rooms the 600+ people who acquired the disease onboard were in. Japan has a defense partnership with the US. I bet if they had asked the US to set up a field hospital near the ship it could have been done in days. What a great joint training exercise that would have been. But bureaucrats can't think out of the box. I remember back to the 3/11 earthquake when the airport was flooded. The US military came in and clear the field in hours and started bringing in supplies. They were asked to leave because they had cleared the cars and airplanes away by simply pushing them into a pile. The bureaucrats were concerned that they hadn't respected peoples personal property. In an emergency the goal isn't to save face. Get out of the way when an ambulance approaches!

2 ( +5 / -3 )

If a ship is not a hospital then why use it as such? JSDF could use it as an exercise real world. Don't they have bases in remote areas? Aren't they expected to deal with emergencies? Think the "expert" government panel might (as usual) have absolutely no idea at all.

2 ( +6 / -4 )

It's the second paragraph that is telling: "The officials said Japanese health authorities faced tough challenges in dealing with a foreign-operated ship that required international negotiations in the absence of established rules in such a crisis."

This says everything about the ineptitude of Japanese bureaucracy. Where are the precedents? Can't do anything without them. In an emergency you don't go searching through file cabinets looking for what someone did in 1957. You size up the situation and act. My late friend Miyamoto Masao wrote that when he was head of a planning committee everyone asked what the precedents were. Masao checked and trashed all the precedences. No precedences, he said, The committee had to ask from scratch. Suddenly everyone became creative. This is what should have been done with the Diamond Princess.

Then there is this bit "a foreign-operated ship." This is not the Tokugawa Era. There lot of foreign ships coming and going from Japan.

The three people who died likely could have been saved had not hamstrung officialdom not been in the way.

2 ( +6 / -4 )

Gov't panel, responding to criticism, says cruise ship not designed to be hospital

Since it isn’t designed to be a hospital or to be a facility to carry out a quarantine, could it be possible that proper quarantine procedures and standards were hard to uphold?

If proper quarantine was not carried out, wouldn’t it be possible that the passengers who tested negative might be positive and the results unreliable?

If the results might be unreliable, wouldn’t it be better to retest and quarantine those that disembarked?

That’s why other countries extended another 14 day quarantine for their citizens.

That the ship isn’t designed to be a hospital requires more due diligence which the government did not put in.

2 ( +3 / -1 )

What the Japan-bashing media and posters here fail to emphasize is that 5 days passed between when the Hong Kong man got on the ship and the quarantine started. And how can we even be certain he was the first one with the virus? It could have been on the ship longer. What we do know is it was obviously spreading before the quarantine started, otherwise only the Hong Kong man would've been infected. So pretending that all of the infections occurred during the quarantine is a pretty ridiculous assumption.

That being said, 55 crew infected shows how this could have spread, even without any air circulation problem as the so-called experts insisted on. So definitely this was far from perfect. How far? Depends on how bad the situation was when it showed up on Japan's doorstep.

2 ( +3 / -1 )

As a person over 60 and with compromised health - as most over 60s are - I fully support isolation and quarantines. A vaccine would be helpful but is a long way off. Otherwise I plan to live to my late 90s if government incompetence doesn’t get in the way.

1 ( +3 / -2 )

Most posters criticize Japan's quarantine in the ship. The ship has been quarantined since 5th of February. I wonder why nations did not rescue (evacuate) their citizens from the ship soon when nations noticed Japan's quarantine is very bad way. Why and what did nations take so long to send planes and rescue their citizens from Japan? Nations planes came to Japan weeks later. Their governments seem very incompetent about rescue (evacuation). Japan was number one to send planes and rescue (evacuate) its all citizens from Wuhan very soon after first outbreak in China.

1 ( +7 / -6 )

How are those defending the handling of the quarantine explain to us the ministry allowing its own staff that were on the ship for work resume work in their respective offices despite prior cases of 4 ministry officials who were on the ship being infected. The mind boggling reason is that it was in the ministry meeting to make it mandatory to test any ministry staff and only when they are negative before they could resume work but they complain in the meeting that work in the ministry will be impacted if many who worked on the ship tested. Well, they care more about their workload than their own safety.

Expecting them to worry about the general populace and make the right decision is nothing but wishful thinking.

1 ( +3 / -2 )

the thing that I tipped me off to the fact they do not know what they are doing is they let people use public transportation to return home and then told them to self quarantine as if the virus would wait to become contagious before they arrive home.

That's the point - this was one thing done poorly. There were others as well. But these things do not mean the entire quarantine was a failure, nor that "they" didn't know what they were doing. There wouldn't be one single "they", it would be multiple organizations; some bureaucrats, some medical, some quarantine specialists etc.

Some of those people probably made decisions that were really stupid. But if you look at the success of the ship's quarantine, many good decisions were made too.

1 ( +3 / -2 )

Unless you think "effective" means "100% perfect". But I both the person you quoted, as well as myself, are speaking of the real world, not of some la la land where something would need to be 100% to be considered effective.

In that case can you please tell us, according to you what was the % of effectiveness of the situation handling and did you calculate it.

And can you also precise why you talk about "effective" ? There is only one post calling the quarantine "ineffective" and it is not one you are replying too.

Since, I am at it, for the people concerned : you have the right to have your view of the situation but if you think that by defending them by pointing a negative finger to people having different view you are going to get them to change their view (which mostly concern the government handling), you should be aware that this is counter-productive.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

Something has been bothering me about the term "self-quarantine," and I finally figured out what it is. When I think of "self-quarantine," it conjures up an image of someone very politely asking someone else to do the right thing, then turning around and walking away. I remember photos from when I was a boy of houses that were under a quarantine, and it involved large signs plastered on the outside of the house, and a legal requirement that the individuals stay inside until told that it was safe to come out. Today's technology might even allow for the use of an ankle bracelet, as is used for criminals. Not suggesting that people should be abandoned inside their home, but that isolation should be taken seriously.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

They may do a movie about it ^_^

0 ( +3 / -3 )

Now that China has built their 1,000 bed hospitals, maybe Japan can bring the workers over to build a few here. /sarc off/

0 ( +2 / -2 )

It seems that not all of the cases have been reported in the general media, but there are more.

https://www.kanaloco.jp/article/entry-279545.html

0 ( +3 / -3 )

Why and what did nations take so long to send planes and rescue their citizens from Japan?

Because most people, particularly overseas, thought that Japan can manage very well, especially after Hong Kong did so efficiently in a similar situation. They'd also expect that protocols were in place for large scale medical emergencies for a megalopolis of 38 million with the Olympics scheduled in the very near future.

0 ( +3 / -3 )

If they admit the cruise ship is not a hospital and inadequate for controlling infected patients... why did they keep them there? Get them to a hospital on land seems like the best solution no? Yet now they claim no responsibility because the ship is not a hospital.

Are they aware that they are making themselves look like idiots?

Obviously you didn't read a couple paragraphs down where it says "it was not feasible to test and relocate all of them for quarantine elsewhere."

0 ( +3 / -3 )

No news and not a comment on how was the Tianjin Costa Serena handled. No news is good news,

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Did they assess how bad the situation was before making the decision?

Actually I must have read it wrong. According to Wikipedia the Hong Kong man was on the ship from Jan 20-25th, so its possible the infection was spreading for around 10 days before quarantine started (assuming he was the first one infected).

As far as I know, there were 10 infections found right off the bat, and assuming they were only able to test a small sample of passengers, they must have assessed the situation as pretty darn bad.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Then why did the japanese gov't leave them on the Ship ???.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

In the future, Japanese government should buy a used tanker/cargo ship and convert it into a large hospital/quarantine/natural disaster shelter ship and keep it in Tokyo Bay ready to be deployed at moments notice.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

The primary purpose of quarantining the Diamond Princess was to protect the larger population. Treating and caring for the passengers and crew has to take a back seat to protecting the billions of people not on the ship. That said, we are no longer in the 1800s, and a level of care that offers hope is potentially available for those in quarantine, whether on a ship or on land.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Yes. That is why the criticism is that the people should have been move to actual hospitals.

-1 ( +2 / -3 )

"The ship was not designed to be a hospital. The ship was a ship," said Shigeru Omi, a former regional director for the World Health Organization.

Just as a rose is a rose is a rose? No not quite. There are (please don't be shocked) many different kinds of ship. The Diamond Princess was the kind of cruise ship that was a disaster waiting to happen. Mind you, cruise ships come in and out of Japanese ports without dire consequences. In this case it was the unexpected and no one knew what to do.

They should have.

-1 ( +3 / -4 )

Hongkong also had one, the difference is a small country Hongkong duelly tested 1800 in a day whereas Japan has been unable to test 3700 in 3 weeks.

If you genuinely believe 1800 passengers could be properly tested in a day, .......In the ship.... well ...

Also, check several different media for that news, some say majority of those 1800 were not tested at all

as judged it was not necessary.

-1 ( +5 / -6 )

Why US CDC did not advice their government to evacuate their citizens from the beginning ?

None of world experts gave Japan any advices from the beginning, why they do now ?

The best way is each country evacuate their citizens from the beginning .

Now it is time to discuss how to prevent the spreading and how to treat covid 19 .

-1 ( +0 / -1 )

The purpose of the quarantine was to protect Japan not to protect the people on the Ship.

-2 ( +6 / -8 )

Think about this for a minute. You'd need a building or buildings big enough to quarantine 3700 people. Does this facility exist in Japan?

You obviously missed the key word some in the comment you responded to. That said, Japan cannot forcibly quarantine its own citizens let alone foreigners, and letting only Japanese out sure wouldn't go over well! But I think they should have at least let those with fevers out and into a hospital ASAP instead of putting the crew at increased risk.

-2 ( +1 / -3 )

Then why quarantine?

-2 ( +1 / -3 )

I do not fault the Japanese government for quarantining the ship. Doing so protected the larger population in Japan. However, this is the 21st century, not the 19th century. So when a ship has to be quarantined, more and better consideration should be attempted for the welfare of the passengers and crew of the ship. Such could not be done in the 19th century, when telling the ship to stay away until the disease had run its course was the only option. BTW, the word quarantine comes from the Italian word for forty. Forty days was the period of quarantine back in the 14th century before suspect ships could enter harbor.

It seems to me that not enough attention was paid to the advice of medical professionals and scientists, and too much decision-making was made by non-professionals. Still, things could have been done more poorly, such as was done in Cambodia with the Holland America ship Westerdam. The government there not only allowed the ship to dock, but allowed many passengers to disembark and fly to other destinations before adequate screening and quarantining had been done.

Here in the States things do not look great. We used to have a thoroughly professional pandemic response team in place, but Trump dismantled it in 2018, and fired everyone involved. Not only that, but he has slashed the budget for the Centers for Disease Control. He has just recently asked Congress for an emergency grant of one Billion dollars to prepare the covid virus response, but he slashed the CDC's budget by much more than that.

-3 ( +0 / -3 )

Most posters criticize Japan's quarantine in the ship.

In this case, the quarantine was effective. Was it perfect? Nope. Were there some problems during quarantine? Yep. Did the government make some mistakes as part of the release of some people from the quarantine? Yes.

But, as always, we don't live in a black and white world. Even with the above points, it does not change the fact that the people running the quarantine ran it quite effectively, and the numbers prove that. Anyone saying anything different needs to go talk to a proper scientist that understands these things, instead of joining the hysteria on the internet that isn't based in scientific fact.

-4 ( +5 / -9 )

Get your views straight!

Um, that was a straight view. The quarantine was not perfect, but was effective.

Unless you think "effective" means "100% perfect". But I both the person you quoted, as well as myself, are speaking of the real world, not of some la la land where something would need to be 100% to be considered effective.

-4 ( +4 / -8 )

Afterall, critics are always very easy.  But what the critics would have done ? A better work ? I do not think.

Many praised Japan at first for checking people, not allowing them to get off the ship and put the ship on quarantine. Everything was certainly far from perfect but it was 3700 people on that ship. It is not a classroom, it is more people than in an hospital. It is a hard task.

Everyone should remember that the ship is not Japanese and could have been refused. Japan did accept it as its last port for this cruise was Yokohama and many Japanese were on board.

What happened to the other ship refused by 5 countries before Cambodia does accept it. All passengers were released as apparently no one had high temperatures or cough. But the following day, an American tourist was positive. What happened to all other passengers and what did Cambodia after that case emerged ???

Nothing was perfect but Japan took its responsibilities.

-5 ( +4 / -9 )

That we know of. See the logic failure in assuming that the 12 reported cases are the only cases?

Japan reported 12 cases

Korea reported 231 on same day

Italy reported 27 cases on the same day

Those are facts.

It looks Japan is doing a good controlling the spread.

Number of deaths

Japan 3

Korea 8

Italy 7

It looks like Japan is also doing a better job taking care of those who get infected.

Back to you

-6 ( +7 / -13 )

The rapid increase in South Korea has surfaced because 4800 test a day are carried out and made public.

and Japan did not do any testing and the results were not made public? Question :how did you hear about the positive test results from the ship? The tooth fairy?

-6 ( +3 / -9 )

Was it not feasible to relocate some of them for quarantine elsewhere?

Think about this for a minute. You'd need a building or buildings big enough to quarantine 3700 people. Does this facility exist in Japan?

-7 ( +6 / -13 )

Get them to a hospital on land seems like the best solution no?

The ship has 3700 passengers. In the first place Japan doesn't have enough beds for such infected patients, PCR testers, medicine, virus examiners,,,, everything. Japanese from Wuhan already took most beds, so not enough beds for passengers from the ship.

-7 ( +3 / -10 )

t is common sense that the numbers are low because test are few, even if you suspect you have it, if you weren't in contact with an infected person, travelled to wuhan or Hebei province or had contact with someone from the above places you will not qualify for testing.

Then one take the test? and burn a test kit? Korea only test people in the church and people who came in contact with people who tested positive. It is misleading and you know it, to say they are doing widespread testing.

-7 ( +3 / -10 )

. I wonder why nations did not rescue (evacuate) their citizens from the ship soon when nations noticed Japan's quarantine is very bad way. Why and what did nations take so long to send planes and rescue their citizens from Japan?

Good question. The brutal truth is that they did not want to take the heat and they were not ready. Look at the following story:

Don't Send Them Here: Local Officials Resist Plans to House ...

https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=american+positives+coronavirus&source=lnms&tbm=nws&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiA4aWlwOvnAhWzyYsBHSerD1cQ_AUoAnoECAsQB

America only has to handle 18 cases, Japan had to handle 600

Trump want to dump the positives in Japan.

-8 ( +5 / -13 )

MikaTakaraToday; If you look at it percentage wise, Korea is doing the best and Japan the worst.

Really? OK show me your math

-8 ( +5 / -13 )

The difference is that the Italian government acted very diligently,they quarantined all the area in the north east part of the country,stopping every public activity and cultural and sports event,even closing churches and museums.

In other words, quarantined the city. Just like China locked down Wuhan? Just like the Japan quarantined the ship?????

Is the quarantined areas going to protect the people in the quarantined areas or is to protect Italy from the quarantined areas.

???????

and Italy now has more cases and more death than Japan does. The quarantined fail!!!!????

Back to you.

-10 ( +4 / -14 )

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