04 July 2021 (Sunday) – Coronavirus Digest from Japanese Morning TV News Part 1 (of maybe 1): Headlines and (yesterday’s) numbers
See photo captions for stories
Photo 01
Japan covid-related topics from NHK’s 7am news bulletin today.
– A fever after injection? You might also suspect infection
Exactly a year ago today, heavy rain and flooding in Kyushu knocked covid completely out of the 7am bulletin for the first time in months. Yesterday’s landslide in Atami, Shizuoka, with two confirmed dead, 20 people missing and over 100 houses destroyed took up the first 20 minutes today. There is a lot of shocking footage of it doing the rounds.
In other news, today is voting day for the Tokyo assembly election.
Bonus stuff:
SC: Turns out Abe’s comments were excerpted from a conversation with “journalist” Yoshiko Sakurai.
Hmmm, that name rings a bell, I thought…..
Wikipedia sez:
> “Affiliated with the openly revisionist lobby Nippon Kaigi,[2] Sakurai denies sexual slavery by the Japanese imperial military during World War II (i.e. “comfort women”).[3] She promoted Taniyama Yūjirō’s 2015 Scottsboro Girls film in Japan and the United States, a revisionist film aimed at denying the sexual enslavement of comfort women.[4][5]
> “In 2007, she supported a film about the Nanjing Massacre, The Truth about Nanjing.[6] Satoru Mizushima, the director and producer of the film, has said the massacre is nothing more than propaganda.[6]”
Photo 02
[Taken from the NHK website]
1881 cases confirmed yesterday
[up vs. 1633 for the same day last week. FYI: 1520 for the same day two weeks ago.]
[Jul 4 1881 Booker T. Washington establishes Tuskegee Institute (Alabama) (1881 was an action-packed year, I do urge you to check it out.)
43 out of 47 prefectures reported cases yesterday.
No new daily prefectural records appear to have been set.
Tokyo was 716
[well up vs. 534 for the same day last week.]
Osaka at 148
[well up vs. 88 for the same day last week]
Joining Tokyo and Osaka in triple figures were all of Tokyo’s neighbors:
Kanagawa 254
Chiba 157
Saitama 116
[Tokyo+3 account for two thirds of today’s total]
The number of positives at immigration testing was 14.
Photo 03
[Taken from the NHK website]
Only 9 deaths confirmed yesterday, for a total of 14855.
The total of current active serious cases stands at 501, down 10 on the previous day.
Total recorded cases at 805917.
Recovered cases at 772443 (up around 1800 on the previous day).
[fondles calculator]
Total active cases are at 18619 (UP around 96 on the previous day), another rise.
Percentage of active cases as a percentage of the grand total is 2.31% (nudging up very slightly)
Photo 04
Kansai figures on the regional bulletin.
207 for the region with Osaka on its 5th straight day of over 100 cases [and the first over 200 in quite some time?]
0 deaths confirmed.
Photo 05
[There was a piece on how people are not realizing the fever they had after their jab is not a side effect but is actually covid that they had presumably contracted in the days leading up to the jab. They didn’t explain that explicitly and I am slightly worried that some people will end up thinking the jab can cause covid…]
Anyway, common side effects of covid are headaches and a fever with the effects manifesting most usually the day after the jab.
Photo 06
According to MHLW, a fever of over 37.5C has been confirmed in 2% of Pfizer and 4% of Moderna cases after the first jab.
[I believe the rates are much higher for the second jab, but presumably they are not focusing on that here as it is much more unlikely that you are presenting with covid than a side effect when you get jab #2]
Photo 07
However, it is difficult to distinguish covid symptoms from vaccination side effects.
There are concerns that people with covid symptoms might assume they are jab side effects and not bother getting tested.
Photo 08
HellaWella would like you to get seen by a doctor if:
You have a fever [of over 37.5C] for two or more days
You are coughing or are short of breath
You lose your sense of smell or taste
Photo 09
[they go on to introduce the case of a doctor who has been treating covid patients and is supposed to know the symptoms but who was unable to recognize he was infected himself.]
Photo 10
This doctor had been looking after the health of covid patients up in Hokkaido a few days before he got his jab.
Photo 11
He had a fever for 3 days after his jab, and ended up testing positive for covid.
Photo 12
“After I got vaccinated, I spent two days wondering whether these were jab side effects or covid symptoms.”
Photo 13
If someone’s breathing is rapid, or they say it is difficult [to breath or is feeling bad] for whatever reason, it’s better to get examined.
Photo 14
Government to share restaurants’ infection control measures via “gourmet” restaurant review/booking websites
Unrelated bonus:
https://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20210702/p2a/00m/0na/040000c
Photo 15
Up until now, the government has been asking third parties, such as prefectural authorities, to certify that restaurants taking appropriate infection prevention measures.
Photo 16
In an effort to increase the effectiveness of the government’s efforts to check whether restaurants are taking appropriate measures, the government has decided to conduct a survey of restaurant users via “gourmet” restaurant review/booking websites and share the results with prefectural governments.
Photo 17
Specifically, Gurunavi, Tabelog, and Hot Pepper have survey questions so that users can respond about whether restaurants have measures such as:
disinfection when entering a restaurant,
keeping a safe distance between seats,
wearing a mask when talking [not seeing how that is something the restaurant can specifically implement…]
JB: It can be implemented by staff, by asking patrons who are talking without masks to put them on. I have seen this done, the place was pretty empty, and the waiter came over to the two chatting ladies and asked them to put their masks on. I would happily indicate that when leaving an online review of the place, if there was such an option. This will create peer pressure on other restaurants’ staff to do the same.
Photo 18
Based on this information, the prefectural government will ask stores with inadequate measures to improve and, in some cases, revoke their certification.
Photo 19
Vice Minister Akazawa of the Cabinet Office said, “The biggest frustration for restaurants that are taking appropriate measures is that they are subject to the same requests for closure and shorter hours as those that are not taking measures…”
Photo 20
“…so we have to ensure the quality of our efforts.”