A 32-year-old man from Tokyo has spent the past few months helping his new wife, a European, ready documents for a visa application to join her spouse in Japan by early spring. Had the two known about recent changes to travel restrictions imposed on family members of Japanese nationals due to the coronavirus pandemic, which have left her unable to travel and faced with the possibility of losing her source of income and her home, the woman would not have started packing up her life.

“I would’ve never found out (that Japan has halted spousal visa procedures), hadn’t such revelations made the rounds on Twitter,” said the Japanese man, who asked not to disclose his name, fearing that would affect his wife’s application. He found out about the changes in posts shared by people who had contacted government officials.

He explained that he was confused by the insufficient explanation and what later turned out to be out-of-date information on the websites of the Justice Ministry and Foreign Ministry, which gave him the impression that officials from the two ministries never talked the change through.