Tokyo Covid-19 breaks 5,000 daily infections: Inept Suga and Koike
Sawako Uchida and Lee Jay Walker
Modern Tokyo Times
The coronavirus (Covid-19) crisis in Japan is never-ending and the sense of irresponsibility under Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga is all-pervading. Equally, since Suga took office, the usual opportunistic Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike seems to follow the coattails of whoever leads the country – unlike other Governors, including Hokkaido and Osaka, who are more independent-minded. Therefore, at no point during the more severe coronavirus crisis in Japan – and knowing that new coronavirus variants were more infectious – have Suga or Koike considered postponing the Olympics.
Yesterday, Tokyo hit a record daily high of 5,042 coronavirus infections. Astonishingly, only last week Suga and Koike stressed that the Olympics were going smoothly. Hence, it shows you how little they focus on ordinary people in Japan. After all, the enormous strain being put on the health care system is increasing once more since the Olympics began.
Koike uttered, after meeting Suga last weekend, that “We also agreed that the Tokyo Olympics are going very smoothly.
Suga’s response to the recent increase of coronavirus cases during the Olympics is to redefine who should seek treatment at respective hospitals. Koike expressed mitigating factors concerning the limited resources angle. Of course, billions of dollars were found for the Olympics. Also, Koike had more than a year to focus on bed shortages and plan for the worst-case scenario with all appropriate agencies – just like Suga nationally.
However, Suga and Koike ignored several health care associations and went full throttle on holding the Olympics. Thus despite knowing the potent Delta (first known in India) variant was spreading rapidly in other parts of Asia and throughout the world, Suga and Koike decided to take an enormous gamble. This gamble, like usual, will be felt by ordinary people concerning health, economics, and psychological convulsions related to the coronavirus crisis.
Kanako Mita says, “Suga’s latest grand policy – and rubber-stamped in Tokyo by Koike but with a better public awareness of manipulating language – is to tighten restrictions on people going to the hospital for coronavirus symptoms. Suga and Koike know that many Japanese people have died at home because they feared putting pressure on the health care system. Therefore, Suga’s statement, implying that only people with severe coronavirus should be accepted in cities under health care strains, will bring more confusion – at a time when clarity and support are needed.”
Endless state of emergencies and quasi measures are not working in the long term. Hence, unlike other nations in East Asia and Oceania that have a “zero-tolerance policy” toward the coronavirus, the nation of Japan is very lax.
Suga loathes providing economic support to the people of Japan. Equally, he hates to acknowledge that his Go-To Travel campaign and the Olympics have made the coronavirus situation worse.
Koike plays the political and media game better than Suga despite her enormous failings. Thus Koike deflects from her failed policies by manipulating language and turns the Olympics angle on and off when it suits politically. However, like Suga, she is irresponsible when it comes to the Olympics and her lack of preparations for the worst-case scenario concerning the coronavirus.
Ironically, Koike, unlike many Tokyoites who can’t find hospital beds despite having coronavirus, recently took time out at hospital because of fatigue.
The privileged!
https://stopcovid19.metro.tokyo.lg.jp/en/ – Tokyo Metropolitan Government website for updates about the coronavirus crisis in Tokyo.
https://toyokeizai.net/sp/visual/tko/covid19/en.html – Japan and Tokyo Covid-19 news with more analysis
https://covid19japan.com/ – Japan regional coronavirus statistics
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/ World coronavirus statistics
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