|
 Under the state of emergency, the government has requested
restaurants and bars close by 8 p.m. and stop serving alcohol an
hour earlier. People are also asked to stay home after 8 p.m. unless
they have essential reasons to go out.
Tokyo, Chiba, Kanagawa and Saitama prefectures, which make up 30% of
the country's population, sought the extension past the originally
scheduled end date of March 7 as new coronavirus cases had not
fallen enough to meet targets.
Suga made the announcement, echoing an earlier one made by the
Economy Minister, at the start of a meeting on handling the
coronavirus.
Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike told a video conference of governors of
the affected area that the extension was essential.
"We can't have things rebound now, this is a really important time,
and I think we all understand this," she said.
"We'll keep in close contact with each other and beat the virus."
An early morning meeting of advisers had approved the extension,
which Suga is set to announce to the nation at a news conference
later on Friday.
The measure adds to the challenges facing restaurants and related
businesses.
"As long as the government asks us to endure for another two weeks,
we will follow its instructions. But that would be a matter of life
or death for us," said Akira Koganezawa, vice president of the
association for 55 restaurants that serve monjayaki, a pan-fried
batter dish popular in Tokyo area.
"Without enough subsidies, some restaurants would go out of
business," he said.
[to top of second column] |
 Fuji TV, citing an unnamed
government official, said another extension
until the end of March could not be ruled out.
The Tokyo Metropolitan Government is considering
setting a criteria for lifting the state of
emergency that new daily infections stay below
140 on a weekly average basis, the Nikkei
reported. Tokyo's daily new
infection was 269 on average for the past week through March 4,
according to Reuters calculations.
The government is keen to tame the spread of the virus as
preparations ramp up for the Tokyo Olympics with just 4-1/2 months
until the Games start.
Foreign athletes have been barred from entering Japan to train
before the Games during the state of emergency. It was not
immediately clear if the ban would remain in place during the
extension for the Tokyo region while the order has already been
lifted for the rest of the country.
The current curbs are narrower in scope than those imposed under an
emergency last spring when schools and non-essential businesses were
mostly shuttered.
New case numbers are still a fraction of their peak in early
January, when the state of emergency took effect. Tokyo reported 301
cases on Friday, compared with a record high 2,520 on Jan. 7
Nationwide, Japan has recorded some 438,000 cases and 8,185 deaths
from COVID-19 as of Friday.
(Reporting by Chang-Ran Kim, Chris Gallagher, Takashi Umekawa and
Elaine Lies; Editing by Jacqueline Wong, Gerry Doyle and Edmund
Blair)
[© 2021 Thomson Reuters. All rights
reserved.] Copyright 2021 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Thompson Reuters is solely responsible for this content |
