Daily WHO Reports for the Coronavirus Outbreak (Link)

[bergmann]

Well, going by the TV news it looks like there was no shortage of people were making use of the long weekend to get out and about, and in the case of at least about 100 people spend some quality time in a packed live house basement in Osaka.

My tingly spider sense which caused me to boost toilet paper stock levels in the week before everyone else did is tingling again.

 

[Viggagadye]

I don't know how it is for you guys who are in Japan, but more and more from the outside, it feels like Japan is the place to be. Everywhere else is going into lockdown and the virus is on the rise. Yet Japan seems pretty chill about it but the numbers are still pretty low.

 

[Frenchy]

I don't know how it is for you guys who are in Japan, but more and more from the outside, it feels like Japan is the place to be. Everywhere else is going into lockdown and the virus is on the rise. Yet Japan seems pretty chill about it but the numbers are still pretty low.

Yep... a bit too good to be true isn’t it?

 

[bergmann]

"still" is the operative word here.

 

[impish]

I went to Ikea this weekend. I had looked for what I wanted online and knew exactly what I wanted, so my plan was to bypass the maze, buy what I needed and leave. I was not prepared for the amount of stupidity going on there. Ikea was packed. I don't understand the ignorance of people going out in as an entire family some with infants while the rest of the world has locked stuff down. I'm not saying people shouldn't be allowed to shop, but have some common sense. If you need to buy something from Ikea, and you need to go pick it up, don't take the whole family, and get in, get what you want and get out...

 

[Sudsy]

I went to Ikea this weekend. I had looked for what I wanted online and knew exactly what I wanted, so my plan was to bypass the maze, buy what I needed and leave. I was not prepared for the amount of stupidity going on there. Ikea was packed. I don't understand the ignorance of people going out in as an entire family some with infants while the rest of the world has locked stuff down. I'm not saying people shouldn't be allowed to shop, but have some common sense. If you need to buy something from Ikea, and you need to go pick it up, don't take the whole family, and get in, get what you want and get out...

Better yet - Ikea now has online shopping and delivery charges are less than what you'd spend on gas and tolls or train fair to get out there.

 

[Frenchy]

My tingly spider sense which caused me to boost toilet paper stock levels in the week before everyone else did is tingling again.

aaaah so it was YOU the reason why I had to use towels to clean my ass for weeks!
So what will your tingling do next? Buying a whole hospital just in case?

 

[impish]

Better yet - Ikea now has online shopping and delivery charges are less than what you'd spend on gas and tolls or train fair to get out there.

I live fairly close to Ikea, gas is about $2, tolls are $2, delivery was significantly more than that. But in general, I agree.

 

[namae]

I don't know how it is for you guys who are in Japan, but more and more from the outside, it feels like Japan is the place to be. Everywhere else is going into lockdown and the virus is on the rise. Yet Japan seems pretty chill about it but the numbers are still pretty low.

Maybe more due to good luck than good management.

They have dropped the ball a few times, and they still don't seem to have things under control at the airports ...which is now the front line in stopping Japanese returnees from Europe/US and elsewhere bringing the virus home. Like the Okinawa family who ignored "instructions" at Narita airport on returning from Spain and took the virus on a connecting flight back home to Okinawa.

 

[bergmann]

aaaah so it was YOU the reason why I had to use towels to clean my ass for weeks!
So what will your tingling do next? Buying a whole hospital just in case?

First thing is to get a haircut while that kind of thing is still permitted.

Meanwhile I see the first baby steps towards postponing the Olympics are being made, despite the sacrificial efforts of 50,000 citizens in Sendai to queue in close formation to see flames coming out of a fancy metal pipe.

 

[TAG Manager]

Jesus... Japan is getting raked against the coals on various social media platforms. Some of the info is accurate, some of it is way off base and is pure speculation.

I guess we’ll see who was right after a few more months. I think all of us are being more cautious but most of Japan refuses to live in fear of what could happen. Frankly, I believe that if it was gong to get bad, it would have done so already.

Not going to argue with people who don’t live here, just not worth it. Best argument I’ve see so far is Japan’s mortality rate... that can’t be hidden, it would be easy to see if hospitals or crematory services were overrun - which they aren’t from what I can see.

I’m still working from home for another 2 weeks at least. (and have been since Mar. 2)

 

[Frenchy]

Jesus... Japan is getting raked against the coals on various social media platforms. Some of the info is accurate, some of it is way off base and is pure speculation.

I guess we’ll see who was right after a few more months. I think all of us are being more cautious but most of Japan refuses to live in fear of what could happen. Frankly, I believe that if it was gong to get bad, it would have done so already.

Not going to argue with people who don’t live here, just not worth it. Best argument I’ve see so far is Japan’s mortality rate... that can’t be hidden, it would be easy to see if hospitals or crematory services were overrun - which they aren’t from what I can see.

I’m still working from home for another 2 weeks at least. (and have been since Mar. 2)

also here they were the kings at social distanciation already anyway (bowing, no kiss, no hug, no street fights , no talk with strangers, plenty of otakus etc)

 

[TAG Manager]

also here they were the kings at social distanciation already anyway (bowing, no kiss, no hug, no street fights , no talk with strangers, plenty of otakus etc)

Yeah, that’s all legit... haha.

 

[Frenchy]

Yeah, that’s all legit... haha.

Having said that there are rumors situation is getting bad in Kobe

 

[Danbo]

Jesus... Japan is getting raked against the coals on various social media platforms. Some of the info is accurate, some of it is way off base and is pure speculation.

I guess we’ll see who was right after a few more months. I think all of us are being more cautious but most of Japan refuses to live in fear of what could happen. Frankly, I believe that if it was gong to get bad, it would have done so already.

Not going to argue with people who don’t live here, just not worth it. Best argument I’ve see so far is Japan’s mortality rate... that can’t be hidden, it would be easy to see if hospitals or crematory services were overrun - which they aren’t from what I can see.

I’m still working from home for another 2 weeks at least. (and have been since Mar. 2)

Truth is probably somewhere in between. I mean everybody knows that the number of infected people is bullshit because Japan doesn't do enough testing, but as long as the mortality rate stays low as it is and the hospitals have no serious issues, the situation seems under control.

Hehe, it's always kinds ridiculous to speak to people who don't live here and listen to what they have to say. Like you said it's pointless to argue. They have a pretty wrong image in their mind. We are lucky that life here is still pretty normal, but of course there is a high risk that things could get worse fast....and I think in some areas people are a bit too careless. Huge gatherings, clubs, big hanami picknicks are things that should really be shuts down because they are an unnecessary risk.

 

[Ken1988]

also here they were the kings at social distanciation already anyway (bowing, no kiss, no hug, no street fights , no talk with strangers, plenty of otakus etc)

One thing that the J-gov emphasizes is the importance of ventilation. Their advocacy poster's first "you shouldn't" is "You shouldn't be in a confined space with insufficient ventilation". In other words, as long as the space is open and well ventilated, social distancing is not necessary.
https://www.mhlw.go.jp/content/10900000/000610429.pdf

I think the rationale is some J-gov experts' experience when they were seconded to WHO when SARS outbreak took place. Also that's the answer to a question like "why crowded trains have not been a cluster?"

 

[namae]

also here they were the kings at social distanciation already anyway (bowing, no kiss, no hug, no street fights , no talk with strangers, plenty of otakus etc)

I am generally pretty comfortable with how Japan is handling things. The basic message here is don't worry ...unless you have pneumonia like symptoms don't bug your doctor or hospital. Soldier on...do what you normally do with a cold/flu. Plenty of spare hospital beds and testing capacity - just not wasting it on middle aged expats with a cold.

 

[Anna Summer]

Other parts of the world have been shutting down businesses immensely

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/ar...huts-Australia.html?__twitter_impression=true

my guess is half the world will be bankrupt in no time....

 

[Sudsy]

Having said that there are rumors situation is getting bad in Kobe

There are also rumours in Japanese social media that the government is preparing to lock down Tokyo.

Thing is - they can't. They simply do not have the legal authority to do so.

 

[MikeH]

my guess is half the world will be bankrupt in no time....

The rich half of the world is shutting itself down, the poorer part cannot as then people would starve to death. Well, after six months of lock downs there is no rich part of the world anymore, so it evens up?

 

[just4fun]

The rich half of the world is shutting itself down, the poorer part cannot as then people would starve to death. Well, after six months of lock downs there is no rich part of the world anymore, so it evens up?

Revolution!!!

 

[MikeH]

There are also rumours in Japanese social media that the government is preparing to lock down Tokyo.

Thing is - they can't. They simply do not have the legal authority to do so.

The governments have declared states of emergencies already in Europe, which were last used in WWII, and which allow them to do basically anything.

 

[RandomTokyoGuy]

Germany also has super low numbers of death so far, 94 atm and 20 or 25 stem from a cluster where someone decided to bring the bug to an elderly home full of 80+ year olds in poor physical condition.

In Italy on the other hand you have almost 1 in 10 of the infected cases ending up dead.

The death rate in Germany atm is about 0.3%, while Japan, UK, France, Spain hover around 4-6%. Even Korea, who very widely tested, are at about 1.2%. Germany has about the same number as Spain btw, which is about half of Italy's infections.

Japan's health system is very well equipped with intensive care beds, from what I read. So is Germany, which definitely helps in reducing the numbers, but a big junk of those huge numbers especially in Italy is due to patients not receiving proper medical care.
When the outbreak was in Wuhan, the Chinese government just randomly picked up medical staff all over the country and sent them to Wuhan and they built a few huge hospitals in no time to create that capacity for Corona patients. None of that is happening in Europe, even though in Italy it is similarly locally confined.

How well Japan is really prepared, we will only see, when numbers go through the roof. Even with those families going to IKEA, most of my Japanese friends refrain from going out atm.

Japan probably empirically proves that commutes are not a main way of transmission. Otherwise it would be hard to understand that there is so little so far with all those packed trains.

 

[MikeH]

but a big junk of those huge numbers especially in Italy is due to patients not receiving proper medical care.

I am not so sure that is true. The average age of those who have registered being killed by corona in Italy is around 80. That's like 2 years less than the normal average age of death in there. So it seems the virus has run through their elderly, and these are the folks that would be killed by your regular influenza virus if that was let run amok. Also there have been claims the Italians are registering every death by pneumonia as corona deaths, even for the patients in hospice care.

 

[RandomTokyoGuy]

I am not so sure that is true. The average age of those who have registered being killed by corona in Italy is around 80. That's like 2 years less than the normal average age of death in there. So it seems the virus has run through their elderly, and these are the folks that would be killed by your regular influenza virus if that was let run amok. Also there have been claims the Italians are registering every death by pneumonia as corona deaths, even for the patients in hospice care.

From the reports I see it is mainly restricted to northern Italy and while people get hospitalised there, they are lacking respirators and cardiopulmonary machines to cover all the serious/critical cases. Of course it still mainly kills the elderly, but the numbers are through the roof compared to basically any other country. Could of course be that the virus just likes pasta a lot ...
If you look at the numbers from China outside Wuhan, they are about the level of South Korea.
There are probably differences in how the bug spreads in different age groups depending on country, but the mortality rates are so vastly different ... And for that matter, Japan isn't exactly a young society.

Obviously it's a complex topic with more than just a singular reason, but the reports from Italy very much mirror those from Wuhan.