With the daily tally of COVID-19 cases in Japan topping 100,000 on Thursday, setting a new record, the question of whether the government should declare a new state of emergency is high on the agenda.
At present, 34 out of 47 prefectures are under a quasi-emergency that allows governors to impose or request shorter business hours for restaurants and bars, with Wakayama Prefecture to be added Saturday.
But calls are growing for the government to impose a stricter state of emergency. Unlike lockdowns in other countries, Japan’s state of emergency does not come with stay-at-home orders or curfews. Instead, it allows local governments to order or request business closures, in addition to the ability to shorten operating hours.
“In the past, the government would have declared a state of emergency by now. Why are you not even considering it?” said former health minister Akira Nagatsuma, a veteran lawmaker of the opposition Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan, during a Diet session on Wednesday.
Outside of Japan, some nations have also steered away from stricter measures even as case counts remain high.
Denmark, which reported 44,225 new cases on Thursday, lifted all COVID-19 restrictions from Tuesday, the first European country to do so. In England, mask mandates are no longer in place, and rules requiring proof of vaccination to enter some venues have been eased. The U.K. reported 88,171 cases on Thursday, though that figure is about 40% of the peak recorded a month ago.
Amid the omicron-driven wave in Japan, many are asking whether a state of emergency is really the right call.
Experts and prefectural governors are becoming increasingly skeptical about whether measures aimed at restricting people’s movement will be effective.
During the fifth wave of the pandemic last summer, Shigeru Omi, chairman of the government’s coronavirus subcommittee, repeatedly spoke about the need to restrict the flow of people in usually crowded areas.
Omi, however, says the government's COVID-19 strategy should be adjusted as the situation on the ground changes.
Nearly 80% of the population has been vaccinated twice, the nation's booster rollout is gearing up and treatment drugs designed to prevent symptoms from becoming severe have been available since December. In addition, omicron is different from the delta variant — while it is more transmissible, it is less likely to lead to severe symptoms.
“We can’t continue doing what we have been doing,” Omi told reporters on Jan. 19. “It’s necessary to come up with measures that are effective and tailored to suit the characteristics of omicron.
“Restricting the number of people rather than restricting the flow of people” is the key, Omi said. “There is no need to stay at home.”
What Omi was trying to emphasize was the importance of narrowing down the list of things people shouldn’t be doing to include only high-risk activities — for example, speaking loudly with a large number of people without a mask in a poorly ventilated room — rather than vastly restricting people’s activities and businesses.
“If you dine quietly with about four people who you are with on a daily basis, and wear a mask when you talk, there is no need to close down shops,” he said.
Some local leaders have already shifted away from the idea of a quasi-emergency or a state of emergency, given the socioeconomic cost such moves have on society.
Nara Gov. Shogo Arai is one of them. Even though many neighboring prefectures in the Kansai area — Osaka, Kyoto, Hyogo and Wakayama — are under quasi-emergencies or soon will be, Arai is determined not to add Nara to the list. Nara also skipped emergency requests during the fifth wave.
“Imposing (a quasi-emergency) without verifying whether it is effective or not is ... not a good way to fight,” Arai said during a news conference on Tuesday.
When cases soared last year, Nara imposed its own emergency measures in the prefecture, asking businesses to implement shorter hours. It then compared daily case totals in the April-June period in cities with the measures in place versus those with no measures. According to Nara's analysis, there was not a big difference in how daily case counts declined.
“In Nara, we are not seeing its effectiveness, so we are not going to fight it that way,” Arai said, adding that the prefecture will focus on ensuring that its health care system will not become overwhelmed.
Discussions so far about the government’s coronavirus countermeasures have been focused on whether or not to impose a state of emergency for prefectures where cases are high and rising, in addition to pushing vaccines and treatments.
This week, Prime Minister Fumio Kishida was asked on a near daily basis about whether the government will issue a state of emergency for Tokyo. Kishida’s comments that he is “not considering such a move for now” subsequently become one of the top news stories.
Experts have largely agreed that lockdowns and other measures aimed at restricting people’s movement, including traveling, dining out and participating in large-scale events, have contributed to curbing the spread of infections in the past two years of the pandemic.
Koji Wada, a professor of public health at the International University of Health and Welfare, said quasi-emergency and state of emergency measures may have some impact in terms of raising people’s awareness and pushing companies and schools to switch to an emergency footing.
“But the pandemic will not be contained just with the emergencies, because there will still be a certain amount of human contact in the communities that would lead to transmission among people,” said Wada, who is also a member of a health ministry’s coronavirus expert panel.
Once the majority of the population gets booster shots, people should make their own decisions about what they can and can’t do depending on their health risks, rather than government-imposed restrictions, Wada said, adding that experts can draft basic guidelines as an example.
With COVID-19 expected to become endemic, countermeasures are likely to evolve from stringent government-led measures to something less restrictive, and countries like Denmark are starting to move in that direction. But the evolution may vary from county to country based on cultural differences and mindsets about what measures are the best fit — from strict government intervention to approaches focused more on individual decisions.
“It’s time for political leaders to start a conversation with the public on the direction Japan should be headed,” Wada said.
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