Infectious disease experts on Saturday decided to review its Go to Travel tourism promotion campaign, criticizing the move as too late and would have little effect in preventing further spread of COVID-19.
“The review was late. It should have been conducted at least two weeks ago,” said Yoshito Nikki, a visiting professor of infectious diseases at Shoa University.
Referring to Japan’s second-worst level on a four-tier scale to measure the spread of the deadly virus, Nikkei said Hokkaido and Tokyo are currently in Phase 3 conditions with a rapid increase in infected people.
On Sunday, 391 new cases of COVID-19 were reported in Tokyo, dropping below 500 for the first time in four days.
As part of the review, Prime Minister Yoshihid Suga said on Saturday that the government has decided to suspend new travel reservations under the Go to Travel subsidy program where infections are on the rise.
The country’s virus task force had earlier recommended the government consider reviewing the program. About 400 million people took advantage of the campaign from July 22 to October 31, according to the tourism agency.
But Suga and government officials did not say when the travel campaign would be suspended and which areas would be affected.
The decision, taken without prior details, has caused confusion among local officials, the tourism industry and the general public.
The government will try to unveil the specifics in the next few days about how it will partially suspend the campaign, a senior government official said on Sunday.
“After any decision of action in the coming days, we will work with the prefectural governors to formulate (a new policy),” Yasutoshi Nishimura, head of the government’s coronavirus response, told NHK. “We can’t wait a week or two.”
The lack of details on what will force the review has convinced some experts.
“It’s not clear in which areas the government is spreading the infection, as it relates,” Nikki said. “The move will not have much effect unless travel to such areas is also stopped.”
With a record number of coronavirus cases last week in some prefectures, including Tokyo, Osaka, Hugo and Saitama, perhaps the most pressing, Nikki said, there was a clear lack of urgency among the people.
“Considering the movement of people on this first day of the three-day weekend, I can’t recognize the sense of crisis in our society,” he said.
“Go to travel should be completely stopped until the peaks of the current third wave (coronavirus infection) come,” Nikki said. “The government should take immediate steps to slow the spread of the infection and send a strong message to the people.”
“Probably. The government seems to be tolerating travel in areas where the virus has spread to areas with very low cases of infection,” said Arisa Sugawara, a professor of infection control at Tokyo Healthcare University.
According to Sugawara, the government should consider suspending travel to the prefectural border for the current period.
“There should have been a more rigorous review,” he said.
As of Saturday, there were 313 Kovid-19 patients with serious illnesses in Japan, according to the health ministry. The number is still lower than the peak of 328 logged on April 30.
“We need to mark success in keeping the number of critically ill patients relatively low,” he said. “But when winter comes, the air temperature and humidity drop, making it easier to catch the novel coronavirus.”
Sugavara said it can be predicted that if the number of virus carriers increases, patients with severe symptoms will also start to grow after a while.
He added that the government should now take steps to limit the movement of people.
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