28 May 2022, Saturday — Coronavirus Digest from Japanese Morning TV News Part 1 (of 1): Headlines and (yesterday’s) numbers

Day 761 of doing these daily posts continuously.

See photo captions for stories.

Photo 01

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

Foreign tourists: Expectations and anxiety

And the 9pm bulletin last night had the covid numbers and a huge piece on seeing if people had taken on board the new government guidelines about masks. (If I find some free time early next week, I will catch up on that.)

Photo 2a

27549 new cases confirmed

[vs. 37438 for the same day last week. 39647 the same day two weeks ago.]

[This is a solid drop, and the top of the screen notes that the weekly average of new cases for the 7 days up the yesterday vs. the previous seven days is down in 46 out of 47 prefectures.

Sorry, I had to pick up the screenshots with the sound off today so I don’t know which prefecture is in a growth phase.]

47 out of 47 prefectures reported cases yesterday.

No new daily case records.

Nowhere with five digits

Quadruple figures in 9 prefectures:

Okinawa, Fukuoka, Hyogo, Osaka, Aichi, Tokyo, Kanagawa, Saitama and Hokkaido

36 prefectures in triple figures

2 prefectures in double figures

Tokyo on 2630 [vs. 3573 same day last week]

Osaka on 2210 [vs. 2991 same day last week]

[Tokyo has been down vs. same day previous week for 14 straight days now]

The number of positives at immigration testing was 88

Photo 02b

The total of current active serious cases stands at 90, down 5 from the previous day.

38 deaths announced yesterday, for a total of 30518

Total recorded cases at 8773744

Recovered cases at 8388987 (around 34,000 recovered cases from the previous day)

Total active cases are at 354,239 (down around 7000 vs the previous day).

Percentage of active cases as a percentage of the grand total is 4.03%

Today’s death toll puts the Japan total over 30500 and triggers my 500 death benchmarking.

It’s taken 14 days to pass the 30,500 mark (30518 on May 28, 30023 on May 14)

It took 14 days to pass the 30,000 mark (30023 on May 14, 29525 on April 29)

It took 12 days to pass the 29500 mark (29525 on April 29, 29015 on April 17)

It took 9 days to pass the 29000 mark (29015 on April 17, 28548 on April 08)

It took 8 days to pass the 28500 mark (28548 on April 08, 28035 on March 31)

It took 6 days to pass the 28000 mark (28035 on March 31, 27502 on Mar 25)

It took 5 days to pass the 27500 mark (27502 on Mar 25, 27072 on Mar 20)

It took 3 days to pass the 27000 mark (27072 on Mar 20, 26641 on Mar 17)

It took 4 days to pass the 26500 mark (26641 on Mar 17, 26084 on Mar 13)

It took 3 days to pass the 26000 mark (26084 on Mar 13, 25546 on Mar 10)

It took 2 days to pass the 25500 mark (25546 on Mar 10, 25084 on Mar 08)

It took 3 days to pass the 25000 mark (25084 on Mar 08, 24646 on Mar 05)

It took 2 days to pass the 24500 mark (24646 on Mar 05, 24156 on Mar 03)

It took 2 days to pass the 24000 mark (24156 on Mar 03, 23683 on Mar 01)

It took 3 days to add another 500 (23683 on Mar 01, 23085 on Feb 26)

It took 2 days to add another 500 (23085 on Feb 26, 22601 on Feb 24)

It took 2 days to add another 500 (22601 on Feb 24, 22033 on Feb 22)

It took 2 days to add another 500 (22033 on Feb 22, 21702 on Feb 20)

It took 3 days to add the previous 500 (21702 on Feb 20, 21,002 on Feb 17)

It took 2 days to add another 500 (21,002 on Feb 17, 20536 on Feb 15)

It took 3 days to add another 500 (220536 on Feb 15, 20105 on Feb 12)

It took 3 days to add another 500 (20105 on Feb 12, 19629 on Feb 09)

It took 5 days to add another 500 (19629 on Feb 09, 19070 on Feb 04)

It took 12 days to add another 500 (19070 on Feb 04, 18500 on Jan 23)

It took 82 days to add another 500 (18500 on Jan 23, 18000 on Oct 13)

Before that 15 days, 11 days, 8 days, 9 days, 12 days, 35 days, 22 days, 11 days, 6 days, 5 days, 6 days, 5 days, 4 days, 6, 5, 6, 5, 4, 5, 7, 8, 11, 14, 14,10, 9, 6, 7, 5.

In Jan 01 2021 figures (i.e. for 31 Dec 2020, i.e. for ALL of 2020 year), the total deaths stood at 3505.

In Jan 01 2022 figures (i.e. for 31 Dec 2020, i.e. for ALL of 2020-2021), the total deaths stood at 18405. [So we added 14900 in 2021.]

We are on 12,113for the year so far (3-4 times 2020’s total, and two thirds of 2021’s total in just under 5 months).

Deaths the day before Suga became PM stood at 1460 (i.e. under Abe), 16000 deaths were Suga’s watch (11 times as many as Abe; Suga had a year of covid vs. Abe’s 6 months though). This makes 13000 under Kishida (about 9 times Abe’s and over 75% of Suga’s in 7 or 8 months).

Photo 03

With the country about to reopen to foreign tourists, NHK looks at the “expectation and anxiety” this is generating.

Photo 04

[Here we go repeating stuff:]

The daily entry cap will be raised from the current 10K to 20K next month.

(This latter number will include foreign tourists from June 10 onwards.)

Tourists will be accepted from 98 countries initially including USA, South Korea and China.

In order to prevent infections, tourists will be limited to supervised, guided tours.

Photo 05

So they looked at tourist-related businesses that stood to benefit.

This “Ninja Experience” place did a roaring trade before covid came along.

Photo 06

I just love that he is sanitizing his throwing stars.

Photo 07

He has gone from days of over 100 customers [full booking, and people waiting for cancellations] pre-covid, to days where he has had zero trade, and he has cut staff back from 5 to 1.

Photo 08

Hakodate in Hokkaido peaked at over half a million guests staying overnight in Heisei 30, to just over 1000 last year.

Photo 09

This crab stick [some kind of processed fish-y souvenir] shop is at about 20% of peak trade.

Photo 10

“I would be very to have foreign tourists back, particularly those from Thailand and Taiwan to whom we are greatly indebted.”

Photo 11

Hakodate city authorities are proceeding with activities to lure foreign tourists back, including setting up tourism PR booths at Taiwanese events.

Photo 12

The Japan Tourism Bureau has brought in small groups of strictly supervised foreign tourists to test the waters on an experimental basis.

Photo 13

The foreign tourists have remarked that Japanese infection prevention measures are tough.

Photo 14

“I had to wear [polythene] gloves when getting breakfast from the hotel buffet.”

Photo 15

While many hotels are looking forward to the return of foreign tourists, there are places expressing concerns.

Photo 16

In the absence of foreign tourists, this sumo-themed hotel pivoted towards Japanese domestic tourists who are sumo fans, and raised their occupancy rate from 10 to 30%.

Photo 17

Hotel team leader: “The Japanese guests may think that the foreign tourists won’t be wearing masks and will be uneasy [or stay away].”

Photo 18

The hotel will therefore be encouraging foreign guests to practice ThorPreMe.