The government has decided to maintain the state of emergency imposed for 19 of the country’s 47 prefectures until September 30, the Japanese news agency Kyodo reported on Thursday. The affected regions are still in a “difficult situation”, said the minister responsible for the corona measures, Yasutoshi Nishimura. The state of emergency currently applies to 21 prefectures and should end next Sunday.
Although the number of infections has recently decreased, the hospitals in the affected areas are still overloaded. The “emergency” in Tokyo and other prefectures is primarily about the fact that restaurants do not offer alcohol and have to close earlier.
In mid-August, the number of new infections recorded daily in Japan rose to more than 25,000. Since then, the number has fallen by around half. About half of the approximately 126 million inhabitants are now fully vaccinated, according to the government.
Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga announced his withdrawal last week after months of criticism of his handling of the corona pandemic. He does not want to run for the election of the chairmanship of his Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), which is planned for the end of this month. Due to the parliamentary majority of the LDP, the party chairman usually also takes on the office of prime minister. Because of the infection situation, spectators were excluded from the competitions at the Summer Olympics and Paralympics in Tokyo this summer.