Hi!
And I’m Nathan and welcome back to Ninja monkey.
The place for all things related to Japan.
I do the research so that you don’t have to, and put all the readily available information
into one place.
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Understandably there is a lot of frustration when it comes to Japan’s border reopening.
And although things at times seem impossibly difficult, I try my best to keep you updated
and informed of the situation and hopefully these updates will lead to better insights
and therefore help you out.
Possibly leading to answering the question “When will Japan’s border reopen”
For those of you how might want a more informal setting, make sure you check out one of my
weekly livestreams.
Livestreams are an excellent way to get to know the community better and also interact
with me and ask me any question about Japan’s border and travel related topics.
These weekly update videos are more to the point, and I tend to steer clear from unchecked
or unverified information.
The schedule will be in the video description and should have also appeared on screen.
Anyway, let’s get started...
So, On the topic of vaccinations, Japan has now administered a total of 202,865,566 doses,
this includes first, second and booster jabs too.
This means that for now, out of the population of around 126 million people 80% have now
received one dose of the vaccine and 78.7% have received both doses.
In terms of booster jabs, 1,944,232 third doses have been administered nationwide, that’s
824,851 additional third doses administered since my last update, which is double the
amount of boosters given last week and equals around 1.5% of the population.
As expected, booster jabs are only starting to ramp up, and with the announcement earlier
this week that Japan will bring forward booster shots by as much as two months this is obviously
starting to become a priority for the Japanese government.
"We need to remind ourselves afresh this invisible enemy is tougher than expected," he said.
"I am determined to press ahead calmly with our response based on the latest findings,
while consulting specialists and not letting fear dominate us."
He said.
In additional vaccine news, the health ministry has also formally fast-track approved the
Pfizer vaccine for children aged 5 to 11, with the government preparing to kick-start
the rollout in March.
Team, it’s obvious that Japan’s response to Covid is faster in approach than that of
previous waves.
In last week’s update it looked like booster shots were going to be shortened by a month,
but the current climate is having the government act and change its stance on things.
If anything can be learned from this, it is that Japan is continuously monitoring and
adjusting things, even weekly.
This in my opinion is great and hopefully will mean more transparency regarding the
situation with the border in the future.
And in regard to Covid.
Numbers have really started to escalate and break records nearly day on day this week,
so let’s dive a little deeper.
Tokyo alone reported 11,227 cases on Saturday, a day after being put in a quasi-state of
emergency.
This is a record high for a forth day in a row and more than doubling from a week ago.
The capital has now reached a 31.5% bed occupancy.
Meaning that 2,177 people are hospitalised out of the total 6,919 beds available, and
with 11 severe patients in the capital and 510 beds set aside for them, 2.2% of these
beds are also in use.
As I will mention later in the video, Tokyo and other prefectures have been set to a state
of quazi emergency as a result of hospitalisations being above 20%.
If this number goes beyond 50% in the capital, then a stricter full state of emergency will
be called for in theory.
Whilst nationwide o 49,854 cases were reported on Friday also setting another record for
a fourth consecutive day.
Additionally, the cumulative total of cases also topped 2 million since the government
confirmed the nation's first case in January 2020.
Other places worthy of mention include Aichi hitting over 3000 daily cases on Thursday
and Osaka hitting over 6000 cases on Friday.
These numbers will most likely be even higher once this video goes live.
And with the rise in cases, comes Japan’s response.
The State of emergency.
In last week’s update a few areas were put under a quasi-state of emergency, but since
then a lot has happened and a majority of Japan’s 47 prefectures are now coming under
or moving to seek restrictions on restaurants and bars to cope with surging infections.
12 more prefectures are seeking quasi-emergency declarations by the central government as
a result of daily record cases.
Quasi-states of emergencies were put in to place in Tokyo and 12 other prefectures on
the 21st for three weeks, allowing their governors to ask restaurants and bars to close early
and stop or limit the serving of alcohol, and it seems that more prefectures are soon
to follow as the central government will be making a decision as early as Tuesday on any
official requests it receives from prefectures, according to sources close to the matter.
So team, Although there are many states of emergencies across different areas in Japan,
Being the Capital, I will focus on Tokyo’s situation.
The first thing to state is that in the past borders have not opened up during a state
of emergency.
This is something that we must keep in mind.
However, the fact that a date has been set for 3 weeks’ time, could mean that hopefully
we have a date to look forward to.
Perhaps some positive news will be announced around that time.
It’s obviously now very important to keep an eye on the situation, especially regarding
hospitalisations as this will likely affect the outcome.
And let’s not forget that in the past states of emergencies have been extend and this is
also a possibility.
I do however, continue to remain optimistic that Japan is in a much better place to deal
with things, they have many more tools and experience available to them and are therefore
much better equip to deal with the situation than a year ago.
In respect to students, I’m afraid not much has changed.
Outrageously, Japan announced on the 17th that there are plans to allow only 87 government-sponsored
foreign students into the country when there are thousands more waiting to enter.
The decision was made as a result of "considering public interest and the urgency of the matter,"
said Chief Cabinet Secretary Matsuno.
These are students that have less than one year left until they graduate or finish their
studies and the government decided to allow them in so they can finish their schooling.
Interestingly Matsuno also said the government will consider individual cases in making further
exceptions.
However, notably there are a few important things I would like to bring to your attention
especially if you are a student worker or simply apart from your loved ones.
A petition asking the government to allow students, workers etc entry is gaining traction,
receiving over 30,000 signatures.
I’ll link it in the video description.
It asks the government to reconsider entry for these groups of people who have been waiting,
some for 2 years for entry into the country.
Team, Can we push it to 35,000 or beyond?
It will only take a few minutes of your time and as I mentioned the link will be in the
video description and shared on my twitter and Instagram feeds too!
Additionally, it seems that international news outlets are starting to highlight the
situation of students.
The Guardian has a chilling article that is worth the read, and most importantly highlights
the anguish students are going through to an international audience.
Also this week as many of you might know demonstrations initiated by ‘stop Japan’s Ban’ a group
launched on twitter against Japan’s border restrictions, have been held on Tuesday in
countries such as Mongolia, Poland, India and Malaysia.
More protests are planned this month in countries such as Germany, Austria, Spain and Argentina,
and there are also plans in Tokyo to be held in front of the Prime Minister’s Office
in February, according to organizers.
Demonstrators say most prospective students have had booster jabs and would adhere to
necessary anti-virus measures when in Japan, and urged the administration of the Prime
Minister to clearly tell foreign nationals when they would be allowed to enter again.
So team, as I have been mentioning, we shouldn’t really expect any big news until perhaps sometime
in February.
The fact that the borders are closed with the date set for the end of February and there
is currently surges with record breaking numbers across Japan and quasi-states of emergencies
in place for at least the next three weeks in some regions, tells me that we shouldn’t
expect any mayor announcements for at least the next three weeks.
This is not to say that things can’t change, and it is not to say that drips of important
information will not be important.
As I continue to state, the more informed you are the better equipped to make decisions
and if not keeping you in the loop will hopefully bring some form of comfort anyway.
So team, there’s been a lot of talk internationally about the potential end of the pandemic.
But is Omicron actually pushing Japan to treat Covid like the flu?
An article from Blumberg and various other news outlets states that there are calls in
Japan to start treating the situation as an endemic, as vaccines become more accessible
and virus deaths remain low.
Data is clearly showing that omicron is posing a less severe risk than previous variants,
and according to articles former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe have signaled their support for
downgrading the virus in Japan.
The change would widen access to health care for patients, effectively casting the virus
as no different than the flu.
Even so, its important to note that Prime Minister Kishida has urged caution and pushed
back against his predecessor, who made the call for going endemic in an interview earlier
this month with a local news outlet.
Kishida told reporters last week that it’s still too early to downgrade the virus given
the omicron caseload.
The article goes on to state that as a result of the previous administration being ousted
for a slow response to tackling infections.
Kishida’s administration may be worried that downgrading the legal status of the virus
could be perceived as weak.
So team, what are your thoughts on all of this?
Personally I think its only a matter of time before the pandemic will be downgraded, it
seems to be happening in some other countries.
I guess we need to wonder how long it will take for this to happen in Japan.
I continue to hope that things will ramp up towards the end of February and by then we
will have a better picture of the border situation
Anyway team, if you haven’t got much to say Just say Hi and where you are from!
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So.. that’s all for now,
Stay positive team!
(but covid negative) Till next time, I’ll continue researching and keeping an eye on
all updates until the next video!
So.. till then, Arigatou, gracias, thanks bye!