Munemitsu Watanabe, a 71-year-old office worker who got his first vaccination shot at a large-scale inoculation site in Tokyo on Monday.
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quote of the day
Speeding up the rollout makes us feel safer because it affects our social life and the economy. If 80-90% of the population gets vaccinated, I think we can hold the Olympics smoothly.
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Paul
How long is it going to take to get 80-90% of population vaccinated TWICE and then wait 3 weeks for antibodies to be at full strength? 2021 Olympics will come an go and the 2024 Olympics will come an go before Japan is anywhere near that target!
Tokyo-Engr
I am sorry Watanabe san but vaccinating 80-90% of the Japanese population by the time the Olympics start is a mathematical impossibility.
Aly Rustom
LOL! Good luck with that ol timer!
Pukey2
I hope I'm retired by the time I reach his age.
Tom
Haha such optimism from a 71 old is rare to see.
gaijintraveller
I tried to apply for a vaccination in June. Couldn't. Checked at city office. Server had crashed. Told it was not possible to get a booking for June because they had all gone. Told to book in June for a vaccination in July. Later learnt all bookings went in less than 10 minutes.
There is no way 80-90% will be vaccinated in time for the Olympics.
Akula
Japan is up to around 9M vaccinations now, and doing around 400-500k a day so realistically 50M by the Olympics is possible if things continue to ramp up. 80-90% of the population is wildly optimistic though.
In any case it is good to see a bit more urgency around vaccines.
blahblah222
Haha.. if Japan can get 20% of its population vaccinated by the Olympics it would be a miracle.
For 80-90%? Until you link number of vaccinations to politician bonus pay and give them a cut of 50% of vaccine sales to ensure each politician can each average 1000M JPY+ in income, they have no motivation to do anything to speed up vaccinations.
InspectorGadget
If he thinks they can vaccinate 85 million people in 59 days, the government has done a good job of hoodwinking him.
That's over 1.4million a day.
Pukey2
Big IF.
virusrex
Since minors are not even considered for vaccination there is no real possibility that 80% of the population is going to be immunized this year.
robert maes
That is why the postponement of the olympics makes total sense instead of cancellation.
that and the fact that all concerned parties, including IOC and athletes but also sponsors, Tokyo, the taxpayers, airlines, hotels, bars, restaurants, broadcasters, tokyo2020 organising committee, training camp host cities...benefit from a postponement. Only 6 individuals want the games to go shead in 2021 for personal gain.
Alfie Noakes
They're vaccinating 20,000,000 a day now in China. Mr. Watanabe seems to have had his brain removed and replaced with the NHK early evening news.
JeffLee
A timetable to inoculate Japan's general population still doesn't exist, with 2 months to go to the games, so I'm wondering why this guy was even quoted in the first place.
kyushubill
Yeah, I believe this. Snicker snicker snicker.
Cricky
71 office worker, sorry mate still having to work at 71. Youre choices and views I will take with a slice of lemon and pinch of salt.
MarkX
Just read that elderly people who were able to make reservations for vaccines yesterday are slated to receive them in August! That would be after the Olympics are held. For the rest of us, there is no timetable to when we can get the vaccine!