It was Manabu Yoneshima's dream to cap his medical career by running in the Tokyo Olympics torch relay, a festive occasion he had been training for during nights and weekends.
Instead Yoneshima has postponed his retirement, and his lifelong goal to run the torch relay has been replaced by feelings of guilt as he and his colleagues battle the resurgent virus.
"Is it really right that I — as someone managing the hospital fighting the novel coronavirus — run as a torchbearer and get a nice memory out of it, when everyone else is struggling and putting up with the pandemic?" asked Yoneshima, who manages the Municipal Tsuruga Hospital in Fukui Prefecture, 330 kilometers west of Tokyo.