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TOKYO (Reuters) – A 53-year-old former Japanese minister has died of COVID-19, his party said on Monday, becoming the first sitting lawmaker to succumb to the disease in a nation struggling to close its doors to foreign travelers.
Yuichiro Hata, who was Minister of Transportation in 2012 and is the son of former Prime Minister Tsutomu Hatawho, died on Sunday, the Democratic Constitutional Party of Japan said.
Japan began banning the entry of non-resident foreign nationals on Monday following the detection of a highly infectious new variant of the coronavirus linked to a rapid rise in infections in Britain.
Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga urged calm ahead of the New Year holidays, when hospitals tend to run out of staff, and ordered ministers to remain vigilant.
“They say there is no evidence to show that vaccines already being administered abroad are not effective against this variant, and the anti-infective steps for it have not changed from those of the conventional virus,” Suga said.
“The virus does not recognize the end of the year or New Year holidays. I ask each minister to raise the level of his sense of urgency and comprehensively carry out countermeasures,” he told a meeting of the government’s task force on responses. to the coronavirus.
Japan is facing a third wave of infections, with daily cases reaching a record 3,881 on Saturday, according to public broadcaster NHK.
A Japanese business traveler at Tokyo’s Haneda Airport, where people were scarce, said the government should do more.
“Although Japan is doing things to counteract the variance, there are still case reports in Japan,” said Seiji Oohira, 56, arriving from India, where he works for a construction-related company.
“So I think it is better to tighten the restrictions a little more.”
(Reporting by Irene Wang, Kiyoshi Takenaka; Edited by Andrew Cawthorne)
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