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Japan Times
JAPAN / Regional Voices: Hokkaido
Apr 10, 2020

Shortage spurs rush on materials for DIY virus masks in Hokkaido

A nationwide shortage of face masks amid the growing COVID-19 outbreak has sparked a rise in the number of people who make homemade masks using cloth as a substitution for medical gauze as protection against the novel coronavirus.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Apr 9, 2020

Japanese ICUs understaffed and overlooked as coronavirus influx looms

The health ministry estimates that Tokyo could see up to 700 patients in need of intensive care every day once the epidemic reaches its peak.
Japan Times
EDITORIALS
Apr 9, 2020

A crucial time to keep coronavirus crisis under control

The state of emergency declared by the government this week due to the rapidly expanding number of coronavirus infections in Tokyo and six other prefectures should cause us not to panic but take the situation seriously.
COMMENTARY / World
Apr 9, 2020

With sailors stranded, shippers face a hard choice

Before the pandemic, 100,000 seafarers traveled in and out of the world’s ports every month. Some had spent weeks or months aboard the cargo ships, tankers and other merchant vessels that are essential to moving products and commodities across the globe. In a ritual little noticed outside the industry,...
Reader Mail
Apr 9, 2020

Children are the future

One of the biggest failures of the world in stopping the COVID-19 outbreak was our inability to gauge the actual impact of this pandemic. Probably, we all have been overconfident from the day we began to hear the news of the disease outbreak in China. The laxity of responsible organizations worldwide...
Reader Mail
Apr 9, 2020

Abuse of power is the real emergency

As with most if not all of the government's measures, the state of emergency plans issued April 6 are so full of holes and contradictions, people should be ready for the real emergency to begin soon, not from any virus, but from those wielding power for their own purposes.
Reader Mail
Apr 9, 2020

A poem about COVID-19

Wash your hands! Don’t go out!
Reader Mail
Apr 9, 2020

A plea to the government: Don’t lock down

As a former business journalist for The Economist and a clinical psychologist treating health anxiety, I have watched in admiration as Japan’s economy has stayed open during the coronavirus panic. Now pressure is mounting to lock down the country. I beg Japan’s government not to succumb; a plea on...
Reader Mail
Apr 9, 2020

Denying virus payouts to sex workers violates their rights

Regarding the April 3 story “Concern as Japan’s sex workers excluded from freelancer virus payouts,” as a former self-employed Ginza nightclub hostess, I am incensed by the blatant occupation-based discrimination by the Japanese government. In my five years of experience, all nightclubs I knew...
Reader Mail
Apr 9, 2020

Consider teachers during the pandemic

I work in Japan as a teacher. Despite the news talking about teleworking in recent months, and about how some people are still going to work because of their inability to telework, I’d like to see an article about how schools are still forcing teachers to go in to work, even though we are prepared...
Reader Mail
Apr 9, 2020

Stricter social distancing required

During the early phase of the coronavirus pandemic, Japan seemed to be able to control the spread. However, the number has been steeply rising.
Reader Mail
Apr 9, 2020

This is a good time to change Japan’s academic year

The coronavirus pandemic has been very disruptive, including to Japan’s schools. When I read in the news that as far as California is concerned, all schools in the state will not reopen this academic year, the idea occurred to me that beginning the Japanese school year in April should be changed.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Apr 8, 2020

China and the Japanese sage

When Chinese entrepreneurs found themselves in an existential crisis, the philosophy of Kazuo Inamori provided much-needed answers.
JAPAN / Politics / ANALYSIS
Apr 8, 2020

Behind the scenes, an LDP power struggle over record-size economic package

As the Cabinet approved a record-breaking emergency stimulus package Tuesday, the deep-seated rivalries it has amplified within the ruling Liberal Democratic Party were hidden from view.
Reader Mail
Apr 8, 2020

New ideas for wind farms

I’ve been reading your piece on Iki Island and its environmental problems (“The Climate Crisis: Emergency on Japan’s ‘lucky island’,” Jan. 5). It sounds idyllic: What a shame I don’t speak Japanese and am rather too old now to relocate.
Reader Mail
Apr 8, 2020

In the pink — cherry blossom viewing will survive

First and foremost, I would like to say to Rika Asakura, who wrote the March 20 letter to the editor “School closures are a cruel blow to children” —“Congratulations on your graduation from high school!”
Reader Mail
Apr 8, 2020

Proving loyalty

The article “California formally apologizes for WWII internment of Japanese Americans” in the Feb. 21 edition reminded me of the difficult experience of Japanese Americans.
Reader Mail
Apr 8, 2020

Youth will decide the fate of Japan

Regarding the April 7 story “Emergency declared in Japan for Tokyo, Osaka and five other virus hot spots,” though there can always be a debate on whether the steps being taken are too little, too late, it seems the decision-making is vey Japanese — thoroughly thought through, planned to perfection...
BASEBALL / Japanese Baseball
Apr 8, 2020

NPB closes main office, announces further delays to season after emergency declaration

Like many other organizations in Japan, professional baseball is adjusting to the state of emergency declared Tuesday by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to combat the spread of the coronavirus.
JAPAN
Apr 7, 2020

Tokyo governor asks residents to self-isolate until May 6 as virus spreads

Tokyo Gov. Yuriko Koike has requested that residents of the capital — with a population of more than 13 million — isolate themselves until May 6, starting at midnight Tuesday, amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.
Japan Times
WORLD
Apr 7, 2020

WhatsApp limits message forwarding to slow spread of fake virus news

Facebook Inc.'s WhatsApp tightened message forwarding limits Tuesday, restricting users to sharing forwarded content one chat at a time after a jump in messages touting bogus medical advice since the start of the coronavirus crisis.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Economy
Apr 7, 2020

Key food prices surge in some areas after virus upends supply chains

As the coronavirus pandemic penetrates more deeply into global supply chains, prices for key staples are starting to soar in some parts of the world.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Apr 6, 2020

The price of ‘America First’ has become clear

The COVID-19 outbreak has just exposed, with remarkable clarity, the bankruptcy of U.S. President Donald Trump's “America First” agenda.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Apr 6, 2020

On the eve of possible COVID-19 overshoot in Tokyo

Whatever decision that Abe makes will never be welcomed and will be considered as either “too little, too late,” out of touch with the reality, or probably both.
COMMENTARY / World
Apr 6, 2020

Spain’s tragedy was all too predictable

The prime minister dithered before imposing lockdown measures that could have saved thousands of lives.

Longform

Koichi Tagawa’s diary entry from Aug. 9, 1945, describes the day of the atomic bombing of Nagasaki.
The horrors of Nagasaki, in first person