Japan and South Korea yesterday grappled with surging COVID-19 cases and growing public frustration as Japan’s prime minister suspended a contentious travel subsidy program, while an anxious South Korean president warned of harsh curbs.
Japan reported more than 3,000 new cases on Saturday, yet another record as winter set in, with infections worsening in Tokyo, the northern island of Hokkaido and the city of Osaka.
However, Japan, with a focus on the economic costs, has steered clear of tough lockdowns. It tackled its first wave of infections in the spring by asking people to refrain from going out and for businesses to close or curtail operating hours.
Photo: AFP
The Japanese government has suspended the travel subsidy program, dubbed “Go To Travel,” from Dec. 28 to Jan. 11 nationwide, local media reported yesterday, responding to concerns about its effects on the spread of COVID-19.
Media had widely reported earlier that the suspension would cover only the hardest-hit cities and regions such as Tokyo, and Nagoya, in central Japan.
South Korean President Moon Jae-in also faces sliding ratings as clusters of new infections fuel criticism over what many see as slack containment.
South Korea reported a new daily record of 1,030 infections on Sunday, a big worry for a country for months held up as a mitigation success story, but still a fraction of the tallies being seen in some European countries and the US, where vaccines are being rolled out. It reported 718 new cases yesterday.
Few Asian countries expect to receive significant amounts of COVID-19 vaccines in coming weeks as they manage distribution schedules, allow time to check for any inoculation side effects elsewhere or run their own late-stage trials.
Instead, they are counting on the methods that have largely kept infections in check for months — ahead of the curve testing, stringent travel curbs, strict social distancing and masks.
China, for instance, where the novel coronavirus emerged almost a year ago, has managed to limit new cases with tough, sweeping action.
It locked down an area of more than 250,000 people after half a dozen cases were confirmed near the Russian border in Heilongjiang Province, the Associated Press reported yesterday.
South Korea has warned that coronavirus restrictions might be raised to the highest phase 3 level, which would essentially mean a lockdown for the first time in Asia’s fourth-largest economy.
In Seoul, schools would close from today, a step toward the imposition of phase 3.
In Japan, which is hoping to stage the postponed summer Olympics next year, testing has remained relatively low, peaking at about 50,000 in one day recently.
Testing in Tokyo, which has the capacity for more than 60,000, is now about 9,000 a day.
Meanwhile, South Korea has aggressively ramped up testing to about 89,000 people a day as of Sunday, compared with just more than 22,000 in early October.
Additional reporting by AP
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