A perfect storm is brewing in Tokyo as the capital struggles to smother a burgeoning COVID-19 surge just weeks before the opening ceremony of the Olympics.
Infections were expected to rebound after the capital’s state of emergency was downgraded last month to less restrictive quasi-emergency measures, but perhaps not so quickly.
New cases have been climbing steadily for more than three weeks, municipal officials said Thursday, due in large part to growing pedestrian traffic in public places as well as the increased transmissibility of the delta variant of the coronavirus.