COVID-19 Not Spreading at Explosive Pace in Japan: Panel

Tokyo, March 9 (Jiji Press)--A Japanese government panel of experts offered the view on Monday that the COVID-19 new coronavirus is not spreading at an explosive pace in the country. The country has been showing resilience to the virus to some extent, members of the panel agreed at a meeting held on the day. Still, the panel predicted that infections will keep rising as a trend for the time being, advising people to avoid closed spaces with poor ventilation and crowded places. The panel is expected to disclose its assessments on a series of measures being taken across the nation to prevent the spread of the virus, such as the cancellations of events. On Feb. 24, the panel said that the following one to two weeks will be crucial in terms of whether the virus will spread rapidly or be brought under control. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe later called for restraints on large-scale events and emergency closures of elementary, junior high and high schools, and special-needs schools across the country. The panel said that the country has been able to prevent the pace of growth in infections from accelerating, noting that a small cluster of patients has been detected before expansion in some cases. The panel had called on residents in the northernmost Japan prefecture of Hokkaido to take measures, such as not going outside when they have symptoms of a cold even it they are mild. The panel will announce its view on the effects of the measures around March 19. On Sunday, Hokkaido saw the number of people infected with the virus top 100, becoming the first to do so among the country's 47 prefectures. Takaji Wakita, chief of the National Institute of Infectious Diseases, who heads the panel, told a news conference Monday that the effects of measures including the cancellations and postponements of large events will also become available around March 19. He called on citizens to continue current measures until then. Even if the current COVID-19 outbreak is brought under control, the country would continue to face a situation in which a new outbreak could occur anytime, the panel warned, stressing the importance of establishing a system to detect a cluster of infections quickly. END