04 June 2022


04 June 2022, Saturday– Coronavirus Digest from Japanese Morning TV News Part 1 (of 1): Headlines and (yesterday’s) numbers, and a bit of everything

Day 768 of doing these daily posts continuously.

See photo captions for stories.

Photo 01

Japan covid-related topics in NHK’s 7am news bulletin today:

Special report: The latest wedding scene [This was how covid has affected the usual way that Japanese western-style weddings are held. I’ve put this last and actually picked up a bunch of more tasty stuff from the Friday 9pm bulletin.]

The numbers had to be taken from the website.

Photo 2a

[From the NHK News website]

19271 new cases confirmed

[vs. 27549 for the same day last week. 37438 the same day two weeks ago.]

47 out of 47 prefectures reported cases yesterday.

No new daily case records (probably – the website doesn’t specifically flag these).

Nowhere with five digits

Quadruple figures in 7 prefectures:

Okinawa, Fukuoka, Osaka, Aichi, Kanagawa, Tokyo and Hokkaido.

32 prefectures in triple figures

8 prefectures in double figures

Tokyo on 2111 [vs. 2630 same day last week]

Osaka on 1530 [vs. 2210 same day last week]

[Tokyo has been down vs. same day previous week for 21 straight days now]

The number of positives at immigration testing was 8.

[Border testing has been relaxed even as double the number of people are being allowed into the country. After several days of over 100 cases at the border, we are suddenly down to 5 and 8 for the last two days.]

Photo 02b

[From the NHK News website]

The total of current active serious cases stands at 86, down 6 from the previous day.

32 deaths announced yesterday, for a total of 30727

Total recorded cases at 8916572

Recovered cases at 8627424 (around 27,000 recovered cases from the previous day)

Total active cases are at 258,421 (down around 7000 vs the previous day).

Percentage of active cases as a percentage of the grand total of cases is 2.89%.

Photo 03

The 7-day average increase as of yesterday vs. the 7 days prior stood at 0.68, meaning cases dropped considerably.

Photo 04

Every single prefecture was down vs. the previous week. Here is a representative sampling.

Photo 05

[The Friday 9pm bulletin noted the decrease in cases confirmed at the borders.]

Yesterday (i.e. Thursday) the number of cases confirmed at the border was announced as 5, the first time for this to be in single digits since 10 Dec 2021 [How many people were allowed into the country per day at that time anyway? I seem to remember it was around 2000 heading in to Christmas/New Year.]]

Versus 107 the day before (i.e. Wednesday).

Photo 06

So as we know, as of June 01, the cap on daily entrants to the country has been raised to 20,000.

Photo 07

If you are from “Group 2 countries and unvaccinated” you will be tested at the border.

If you are from the four “Group 3” countries you will be tested at the border regardless of vaccination status.

Group 1 countries will not be tested [regardless of vaccination status.]

[This visual kind of flips the script somewhat, making Group 2 and 3 bigger on the page. If you did this as a pie chart of who is not getting tested, Group 1 accounts for over half, and Group 2 would be split by proportion of vaccinated people. But if we took, just as a rough guide, 50% vaccination of the total population in Group 2, then we would basically be looking at 75% of people not being tested, and that’s if we assume equal proportions of entrants from all countries. The reality is that a far higher proportion of entrants are likely to be from Group 1 which includes China, South Korea and the US.]

Photo 08

At this stage last month, tests carried out at the border found positive cases even among people from those countries for whom border testing is now no longer required.

Photo 09

And the strains detected at the border included overseas variants flagged as being more infectious forms of regular omicron, namely BA.4, BA.5, BA.2.12.1.

[The Guardian the other day was reporting a resurgence in cases in some parts of Europe due to these variants (plus relaxed attitudes).]

Photo 10

Expert panel member prof: “It is difficult to imagine that infected people have suddenly stopped turning up at the border.”

Photo 11

Therefore, it is only natural that we have to assume that [similar numbers of] people who are infected are coming to the country, just as they have up till now.

Photo 12

And so, we must conclude that the [vastly reduced] numbers we are seeing indicate that [infected] people who are not detected at the border are getting into the country.

Photo 13

[Don’t forget that the 20k entering the country and therefore some of the infections we are talking about include Japanese nationals returning to Japan, but the news took a predictable tack:]

From June 10, Japan will resume allowing foreign tourists into the country.

Photo 14

“New virus variants may be mixed in with tourists coming in from overseas.”

[This is true for any person coming back from overseas for any reason but OK…]

Photo 15

“So we have to think that the risk of this will increase.”

[Yes, because govt. policy is based on overall country situations rather than individual vaccination status…]

Photo 16

“We have to make tourists understand the prevention measures that we [Japanese] have followed so far, including effective mask use and avoid the 3Cs,…”

[Wow, it has been so long since I heard anyone mention the 3Cs. Feels like 2020 all over again. Speaking of which, I haven’t heard a peep out of Koike and Yummy-mura for months…]

Photo 17

“..and get their cooperation. That type of education and awareness-building is important.”

[教育啓発 can be translated as “education and enlightenment” but I figured I should dig around for something less likely to make my readers lose their shit.]

Photo 18

[Speaking of masks though, various sections of society are considering mask rules going forward.]

One place where we are seeing changes is in the workplace.

Photo 19

Hitachi is revising the mask-wearing standards it applies to the some 150,000 employees of its group companies domestically.

Photo 20

Under the new guidelines, regardless of whether you are indoors or outdoors, if you are not in conversation with anybody and able to maintain a 2m distance, you don’t need to wear a mask.

[I kind of de facto do this when I go to the office by almost permanently having a coffee on my desk and drinking that.]

Photo 21

You are still strongly recommended to wear a mask if you are having a conversation at close range indoors.

And they are continuing with prevention measures such as indoor ventilation and temperature checks.

Photo 22

The Miyazaki board of education is revising its rules on “silent meals” in schools.

Photo 23

This is due to opinions that even while the rules regarding adults eating and drinking spaces have been relaxed, “aren’t we being too hard on just the kids?”

Photo 24

“A school lunch that we can eat while talking to everybody and saying, ‘It’s good, isn’t it?’ is best.”

Photo 25

The schools [within the board’s jurisdiction] will still not have desks facing each other and you won’t be allowed to talk loudly during meals.

Photo 26

Finally, because it is “June Bride” season [this has always been a headscratcher for me, as June is rainy season in Japan…], they had a look at how Western-style wedding parties have changed under covid.

With things getting a bit more relaxed post-Manbo, a wedding industry group has reported that April’s revenue was at 97.4% of that of pre-pandemic 2019, i.e. wedding parties are making a comeback.

Photo 27

Under covid (and possibly going forward), some people joined by videoconference (and iPads have become a common fixture at parties these days). Participants have also joined this way from overseas.

Photo 28

This particular venue sends a wedding food party pack to remote guests in advance.

[Ka-ching…]

Photo 29

Check out these elegant seat separators.

Photo 30

Couples are ditching the old staples of wedding ceremonies, “entertainment” and bride dress changes, in favor of (in this couple’s case) going round to the tables and spending more time talking to guests.

[It is traditional at these parties for your friends to organize some kind of amateur entertainment: comedy duos and sketches, dance routines, etc. One of my friends told me once how they’d subjected a bemused room to a five-minute acapella version of Hey Jude.]

Photo 31

And the bride and groom have been taking on their own MC duties.

[The reporter for this segment was an NHK guy who got married last month. This is him MCing.

I’d like to think that is actually what his wife looks like rather than something done for privacy.]

Photo 32

This woman from the well-know Zexy company, says couples are aiming for a “noumitsu” wedding with “no mitsu”, meaning a more intimate wedding with more quality time spent with guests while still taking infection prevention measures.

Photo 33

Finally, this is not a covid story, but it also threatens to have a profound impact upon my life:

7-11 are planning to raise the price of their regular coffee from 100 yen to 110 yen from July 04.

[And Family Mart will be doing something similar with its large size.]


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