The novel coronavirus spread has “reached an unprecedented level” in Japan, with around half of the 47 prefectures now in the most serious stage in terms of rate of new infections, a health ministry expert panel said.
The government’s new policy of providing hospital treatment only for COVID-19 patients in serious condition or at high risk of becoming severely ill has sparked criticism that other infected people are being “abandoned.”
With the Tokyo Olympics opening despite a resurgence in new cases of coronavirus infection in Japan’s capital and elsewhere in the country, medical workers and people who have lost their loved ones due to COVID-19 have voiced concerns.
L’archipel de 24 millions d’habitants était parvenu à totalement contrôler l’épidémie pendant un an et demi grâce à des quarantaines à l’entrée de son territoire. Mais cette stratégie a été mise en échec par la découverte de plusieurs foyers de contamination à la mi-mai.
In early January, a Tokyo man in his 80s with diabetes tested positive for COVID-19. He soon started to have difficulty breathing. But with hospital beds filling up fast, public health authorities couldn’t immediately place him under medical care. Then he showed moderate signs of recovery, which emboldened officials to decide that he could, after all, remain at home to recuperate — despite the capital’s guidelines saying that those age 70 or older with an underlying condition should in principle be hospitalized.
Amid the coronavirus epidemic in Japan, franchise owners of convenience stores are torn between worrying about infection risks from continuing operations and a sense of mission about serving as part of infrastructure for daily life.
De la peste noire au Covid-19 en passant par la grippe espagnole ou Ebola, nos sociétés ont souvent été traversées par des crises sanitaires, comme nous le rappelle l’historienne Anne Rasmussen dans cet entretien.
