Japan PM Yoshihde Suga Declares COVID Emergency Ahead of Tokyo Olympics

The Japanese government is all set to place Tokyo under a state of emergency. Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga has announced that Tokyo city will be going under the fourth state of emergency on July 12. This will be till the Olympic Games, August 22. It is to help bring down the Covid19 cases in the city before the event commences.

According to the data provided by the Japanese government, the number of cases in the city has increased and is still rising rapidly. On Wednesday, 920 new cases were reported in Tokyo. It is higher than it was during the fourth wave in mid-May. The daily number is only increasing and a new peak is being reported every day.

Medical and Health experts are now worried about the situation. Even Suga’s COVID-19 adviser Shigeru Omi said that all that is going on right now could contribute to further increase. Amidst increasing cases, we will have Olympics, summer holidays and not to forget the concern of Delta variant; all this could mean more cases.

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As of now, the emergency has not been announced but Suga will make a decision soon. The state of emergency is going on in Okinawa but the decision for Tokyo will come soon. The PM will have a task force meeting today (Thursday). After the meeting, a press conference will be held where Suga will share his decision. The initial plan was to put Tokyo under a quasi-state of emergency, but looking at the rising numbers, the government decided to change it to a complete emergency.

This decision will also bring a change in audience participation in stadiums. This means reduce in capacity at the venue for the Olympics. Earlier it was decided that 50 percent capacity will be permitted but a change will bring reduction to this as well. Chances are that no audience will now be allowed in the venue. More sporting events will have to go on without the fans.