Tokyo: Japan is once gearing up to declare a state of emergency in Tokyo that will last until the end of the Tokyo Olympics, fearing that an ongoing COVID-19 surge will multiply during the Games. The government officials had proposed a plan to declare a state of emergency in Tokyo from next Monday to August 22 during a meeting with experts on Thursday Morning.
The Tokyo Olympics, which had already been postponed a year due to the pandemic, will begin on July 23 and end on August 8. Having already banned foreign spectators fearing the COVID surge, the planned six-week state of emergency is likely to eliminate the possibility of a local audience. However, a decision on this is pending.
The upcoming emergency would be Tokyo’s fourth since the pandemic began, and it had been a last-minute change of plan made late Wednesday after a meeting with experts who warned the government strongly against the soft approach.
On Wednesday, Tokyo reported 920 new cases, up from 714 the previous week and the most since 1,010 on May 13. The figure is consistent with experts’ earlier prediction that daily cases in Tokyo could reach 1,000 before the Games and reach thousands in August.
Ryuji Wakita, director-general of the National Institute of Infectious Diseases, noted that two-thirds of Japan’s cases are from the Tokyo region, and “our concern is the spread of the infections to neighboring areas.”
Experts also noted that cases among younger, unvaccinated people are on the rise as Japan’s immunization campaign had stalled due to supply uncertainty. Only 15 per cent of Japanese people had been fully vaccinated. Japan has had approximately 810,000 infections and nearly 14,900 deaths.
“The infections are in their expansion phase and everyone in this country must firmly understand the seriousness of it,” Dr. Shigeru Omi, a top government medical adviser, told reporters. With summer vacations approaching, he urged authorities to take tough measures quickly ahead of the Olympics.
Japan Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga is expected to formally announce the emergency plans on Thursday, just hours after International Olympic Committee (IOC) president Thomas Bach would arrive in Tokyo. Bach would undergo self-isolation for three days in the IOC’s five-star hotel in Tokyo before traveling to Hiroshima.
