Bruce Chatwin comments

970 is up over the January 4th report of 884 new cases. January 4th was the first day back after the New Year holiday.

Still, the number of 970 would have more meaning if the context of the number of cases was available.

Suga is dithering while according to Daisuke Kurai, professor of infectious diseases at Kyorin University Hospital in Tokyo, "the medical care system is already in a state of collapse".

At the same time, Suga and the denizens of Kasumigaseki don't have to worry about access to timely medical care. And so they focus on maintaining a facade of normalcy.

(Osaka) case numbers have been going down for months 

Osaka Prefecture is facing record daily infections and record numbers of seriously ill COVID-19 patients.

The occupancy rate of hospital beds for those suffering serious cases in Osaka has been hovering around 70 percent since December, with the western prefecture logging a record 171 such patients earlier this month. (it's 168 such patients today.)

Hospitals have been moving to increase their coronavirus wards, including Osaka City General Hospital, which closed four wings last spring and reassigned doctors and nurses to support medical care for COVID-19 patients.

However, the surge in cases continues to grow and the prefecture has been unable to secure necessary beds. "We don't have any more staff to spare and are barely dealing (with the pandemic). It is even becoming increasingly difficult to accept people in need of emergency care" for other reasons, said Michinori Shirano, the head doctor at Osaka City General Hospital.

https://japantoday.com/category/national/focus-coronavirus-third-wave-puts-many-japanese-hospitals-on-overload

Being considered?

Yet more dithering by the inept lot of "professional" politicians in Kasumigaseki.

Nationwide, the number of reported cases was 7,490.

That is a 25% increase from January 6's reported total of 6,000 new cases.

Time for the politicians to get their collective act in order.

Does this mean that Trump and Melania will not be attending the next debate?

What an unfortunate choice for a name.

Why not just call it Grenfell Tower II?

Can anyone say ONE good thing of his 8 years tenure?

He left before it got to nine years?

Alfie Noakes, very well said!

Agreed.

Kono seems to be the best of a very bad lot, so the LDP will probably pass on him...

Not to mention some of the compelling speakers we have heard, especially Ann Dorn talking about her husband, who was brutally murdered by looters.

After Ann Dorn was announced as one of the speakers for the RNC, David Dorn’s daughters publicly opposed her decision to speak and said they were against their late father’s name or death being used for political purposes. “Our father did not agree with many policies and actions of this president that are aimed at disenfranchising many Black and Brown people. Our father was a registered Democrat. He thought Trump is doing many things to ruin our country.”

Very interesting article.

I wonder how many of the doctors have backgrounds in epidemiology, virology, or immunology.

It would also be interesting to know how many of the doctors are under 40, that is how many of the doctors have training that is relatively up-to-date.

Suga has never had a job outside of politics. Suga is completely divorced from the reality that working people face every day.

It seems Kono and Noda are the only candidates not affiliated with the revisionist Nippon Kaigi.

The Tokyo metropolitan government on Monday reported 95 new cases of the coronavirus, down from 212 on Sunday.

What day is this data from? The Mainichi reports that there is a a three-day lag for Tokyo reporting its data:

*It takes one to two days to obtain results from the virus-detecting polymerase chain reaction tests. A time lag occurs as medical institutions then create reports on new infections and fax them to public health centers in the capital, and the metropolitan government compiles the data sent in by each public health center.*

You can't feel anything else but disheartened when you look at Japanese politics, its the same old club of scumbags that push for policies that benefit themselves or their big businesses counterparts.

They should clear the whole diet and start again.

Sadly, the new guard is not so very different from the old guard. IMO, the system of dynastic politics that permeates Japanese politics needs to be done away with before there can be real change, but that seems unlikely to happen.

Please, not the insufferable Aso again. Please...

Moderator: These are not the results of tests done on Sunday.

No. They are the numbers for August 21st.

Welcome news... until the next Pandemic from China's CCP Biological Weapons Department.

Really? I heard the pandemic is part of a plan by billionaire philanthropist Bill Gates who wants to take advantage of the “false” coronavirus pandemic to implant a microchip in the population via an equally fraudulent vaccination, in a bid to control the population of the planet. All of this with the help of 5G and the lizard men elite...

That or it was Abe and Unit 731...

According to the Mainichi:

The number of new infections in a day tends to fall during the first half of the week, and rise during the latter half. The Tokyo Metropolitan Government announces tallies based on reports submitted by medical institutions when they confirm infection cases, and it takes about three days from the time tests are conducted to when new cases are announced. Therefore, figures remain low in the first half of the week as cases from the weekend, during which hospitals are generally closed and few tests are conducted, are tallied during this period. On the contrary, figures announced later in the week include infections confirmed after those who stayed put at home during the weekend visited hospitals earlier in the week. Hence, a gap is seen among figures throughout the week.*

*It takes one to two days to obtain results from the virus-detecting polymerase chain reaction tests. A time lag occurs as medical institutions **then create reports on new infections and fax them to public health centers in the capital**, and the metropolitan government compiles the data sent in by each public health center.*

These are likely Monday's results.

That line gets trotted out a lot.

While others trot out ridiculous lines about "face nappies", "muzzles", and "The media wants us to panic".

What “case burst” - to about what number - do you expect by the end of August? A prediction?

Based on current trends and the govt's inaction, the future looks less than encouraging.

By the way, I see that 1000 cases a day is strangely less than the 1500 nearly a month ago. What happened to the exponential burst of cases?

The number of new infections in a day tends to fall during the first half of the week, and rise during the latter half. The Tokyo Metropolitan Government announces tallies based on reports submitted by medical institutions when they confirm infection cases, and it takes about three days from the time tests are conducted to when new cases are announced. Therefore, figures remain low in the first half of the week as cases from the weekend, during which hospitals are generally closed and few tests are conducted, are tallied during this period. On the contrary, figures announced later in the week include infections confirmed after those who stayed put at home during the weekend visited hospitals earlier in the week. Hence, a gap is seen among figures throughout the week.

Why is there such a time lag between conducting the tests and announcing the results?

*It takes one to two days to obtain results from the virus-detecting polymerase chain reaction tests. A time lag occurs as medical institutions then create reports on new infections and fax them to public health centers in the capital, and the metropolitan government compiles the data sent in by each public health center.*

You can see how the Obon holidays might influence the number of reported cases...

Fax machines... Unbelievable.

By the way, I see that 1000 cases a day is strangely less than the 1500 nearly a month ago. What happened to the exponential burst of cases?

July 19: 512 reported cases

July 20: 411 reported cases

July 21: 634 reported cases

July 23: 980 reported cases

July 30: 1301 reported cases

August 6: 1487 reported cases

August 13: 1176 reported cases

August 19: 1075 reported cases

There were 400 - 650 cases a day being reported a month ago.

The sudden drop in reported cases coincides with the Mountain Day and Obon holidays.

Well, if Taro Aso is in charge of the portfolio, we may as well consider it a done deal!

facts show that his virus will only kill 98.6% of the people unlucky enough to catch it

thus spoke the

bullshitzen

NHK: The Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare has set standards for whether or not they are "severely ill", but it has been found that Tokyo and Osaka Prefecture compile the number of severely ill persons according to different standards. According to Osaka Prefecture, the criteria for judging patients who are infected with the new coronavirus and are being treated as “severe” are the wearing of ventilators, tracheal intubation, and cardiopulmonary bypass.

The critically ill patients in Osaka prefecture who meet this criterion are:

▽ on the 18th of last month, the occupancy rate of the hospital bed for severely ill patients was 2.1%

▽ As of the 1st of this month, 20 people were classified as severely ill (10.6%)

▽As of 17th of this month, 70 people were classified as severely ill (37.2%)

https://www3.nhk.or.jp/news/html/20200818/k10012572621000.html

What if the percentage of false positives is close to 5%, then all these results would be completely meaningless.

8/9: 331 positives / 5237 tested = 6.3% positive rate

If 5% of positives were false that would make 17 of the 331 positive test results false leaving us with

314 positives of 5237 tested and a positive rate of 5.99%.

Completely meaningless?

Please feel free to correct the math if it's wrong.

BTW, the antigen test that the govt is relying on more and more, has, according to the MLHW, a lower incidence of false positives, but it also has a higher incidence of false negatives.

https://www.mhlw.go.jp/content/10900000/000631469.pdf

I highly recommend Fergal Keane's Road of Bones for insight into the gross incompetence among the Japanese military commanders that led to the deaths of 60,000 Japanese troops in one operation.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_U-Go

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K%C5%8Dtoku_Sat%C5%8D

Japan's elderly population is fairly healthy thanks to their diet. Plus, they get a fair bit of sunshine that boosts their vitamin D levels.

A 2020 study on Vitamin D Status in Japanese Adults found low vitamin D levels in Japanese adults in Hokkaido and Kyushu: The prevalence of vitamin D insufficiency/deficiency was 47.7% in summer and 82.2% in winter. ...most Japanese may need to increase both vitamin D intake and UV exposure.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7146414/