The pace of Japan’s vaccination rollout is inexcusable. There are explanations aplenty for the delays, but the answer is simple: The Japanese government has not approached this problem with urgency.
That is inexplicable. Japan is lucky that more people have not died because of the glacial pace of the inoculation campaign, but we should not rely on luck. Luck can, and usually does, run out.
As of May 25, Japan had given out 10 million doses of the coronavirus vaccine and fully vaccinated 2.93 million people, just 2.9% of the population. At least 6.61 million people received at least one shot as of Monday, putting the daily average at less than 400,000 people. Those numbers put Japan 30th, or last, among members of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, the group of industrialized nations.