Joe Tomei here with another update from the JET program prefectural advisors, Lily McDermott & Chase Sutherland. My deepest gratitude for sharing these with us.

===== Dear Kumamoto,

Kumamoto Prefecture has raised the prefectural Risk Level to Level 5. For more information please read the rest of this e-mail:

Kumamoto Prefecture raises risk level to Level 5 Yesterday evening (14 December), Governor Kabashima announced that the prefecture’s independent Risk Level would be urgently raised to Level 5. This is the first time Level 5 has been announced since the new scale was implemented The following are some of the remarks made by the governor in the announcement:

  • In the 6-day period from December 8 to 13, 155 new cases have been confirmed. In addition, the percentage of hospital beds currently being used is 30.8%. Both of these numbers correspond to Level 5 in Kumamoto’s Risk Level System.

  • At present, the infection situation in Kumamoto does not correspond to “Stage III” of the four-stage scale used by the national government in Tokyo. However, large numbers of cases are emerging throughout the prefecture every day, the proportion of cases without a known link has also increased, and the hospital bed usage rate has increased sharply.

  • About two thirds of confirmed cases are of residents of Kumamoto City. In addition, there have been new clusters in entertainment clubs/bars such as host clubs, and the number of infected people related to these clusters has reached 32 over the last week. In addition, there are cases where these infected persons are causing further infections in their homes and offices.

  • As a result, the prefecture will implement two major emergency measures. The first is to strengthen infection prevention measures at food and drink establishments with entertainment. Until now, regarding the use of restaurants, etc., we have asked residents of the prefecture to refrain (Japanese: 控える hikaeru) from going to establishments that have not taken infection prevention measures. From now, we officially request (Japanese: 要請する yо̄sei suru) that members of the public do not go to food and drink establishments with entertainment, specifically host clubs and cabaret clubs where infection prevention measures are not being implemented. Please check the implementation status of infection prevention measures by confirming the sticker posted by the establishment or by calling the establishment in advance.

-The second measure is to strengthen the medical care provision system. It is necessary to secure a system to ensure that elderly people and those with underlying illnesses are hospitalized. Currently the bed usage rate in Kumamoto City exceeds 70%. We are currently making urgent arrangements to further increase the number of available beds by 400. Furthermore, today (14 December) we signed a contract to rent a second hotel building to host up to 80 additional patients with mild symptoms.

  • Finally, we are requesting the citizens of the prefecture to strengthen the measures they are taking to prevent the spread of infection during this period of “concentrated measures” lasting until 18 December. If further measures are required based on the infection situation in the whole country or prefecture, we will announce them on the 18th.

  • If the trend of increasing numbers of infections continues as it is, we may ask for stronger measures, including requests for business to shorten their operating hours or business closures. In order to prevent such a situation, we strongly request that the citizens of the prefecture implement infection prevention measures with even stronger awareness.

See: https://www.pref.kumamoto.jp/soshiki/1/77252.html

Go To Travel Campaign to be suspended nationwide from Dec. 28 to Jan. 11 Yesterday the Prime Minister announced that the Go To Travel campaign will be suspended from 28 December to 11 January.

Avoid travel to Kochi and Saitama Prefectures As mentioned in the previous updates, Kumamoto Prefecture is continuing to ask residents to avoid travel to prefectures in which the number of new cases per 100,000 population over a 1-week period is 15 or higher.

Based on the numbers for the last 1-week period, this now applies to Kochi and Saitama Prefectures, as well as Osaka, Hokkaido, Tokyo, Okinawa, Aichi and Hyogo. You can check the list on pg. 5 of the document here: https://www.pref.kumamoto.jp/uploaded/attachment/123150.pdf