With Japan caught out by Covid-19, the Tokyo Olympics will be a challenge

As infections and deaths mount among Diamond Princess cruise passengers, Japan’s ad hoc response to the outbreak, in part possibly to avoid upsetting China, is looking wholly inadequate. Will it learn its lessons in time for the Summer Olympics?

Rupakjyoti Borah

Published: 11:00am, 27 Feb 2020

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As Japan recorded a third death among passengers who were on board the Diamond Princess cruise ship, the limitations of Tokyo’s response to the outbreak are becoming clear; it has all been very ad hoc.

Japan initially imposed an entry ban only on Chinese passport-holders from Hubei province (whose capital, Wuhan, is where the outbreak started) and foreigners who had been in Hubei up to 14 days before. The ban was later extended to include the neighbouring Chinese province of Zhejiang but it was a classic case of “too little, too late”. Not banning visitors from the whole of mainland China has put Japan at unprecedented risk.

Why did Tokyo fail to gauge the risk? First, it was a new situation for the government and it is very clear now that it had underestimated the risks from the outbreak. The coordination between various wings of the government has also been lackadaisical, to say the least.

Second, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe may have been unwilling to annoy Beijing before Chinese President Xi Jinping’s visit later this year. Abe, who has been trying hard to reset ties with China, visited last October to mark the 40th anniversary of the Sino-Japan Treaty of Peace and Friendship.

Third, mainland China is Japan’s biggest source of tourists and they are big spenders as well. Japanese businesses have a lot riding on these tourists and Abe may have been unwilling to upset the applecart.

A huge challenge lies ahead for Japan with the Tokyo Olympics scheduled for this summer. Some countries, such as Israel, are already barring visitors who have been to Japan or South Korea (besides China) within 14 days previously. As of last Friday, nine countries – Israel, the Solomon Islands, Thailand, Samoa, Tonga, Micronesia, Kiribati, South Korea and Bhutan – had issued advisories against travel to Japan.

In addition, it has emerged that 23 passengers on board the Diamond Princess were allowed to go home without being properly tested, and some of the Japanese passengers were allowed to take public transport home. In comparison, foreign passengers allowed to leave the stricken ship have had to undergo enhanced periods of quarantine after they flew home.

In addition, Diamond Princess passengers had to wait a long time for coronavirus testing to be done. This could have been avoided by involving private labs. The Japanese government was clearly unprepared for the outbreak.

Tokyo’s stand on travellers from China is in sharp contrast to that of its most important ally, the United States, where major airlines have suspended flights to China.

The US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention has also issued a low-level advisory for Japan, calling for “increased caution” from travellers heading there, raising it to level 2 on the four-point advisory scale. Some countries have introduced advanced screening for people from countries such as Japan and South Korea, besides China.

Abe and his team clearly have a lot of firefighting to do. Already, comparisons are being made with the handling of the Fukushima disaster after the Great East Japan Earthquake of March 2011, with Japan getting flak domestically as well as internationally.

A lot remains to be done as Japan comes to grips with the reality of Covid-19. This is surely going to have an impact on the tourism sector, while other sectors that could be affected include aviation.

Clearly, Tokyo has been caught napping with regard to the outbreak of the coronavirus, which causes the disease named Covid-19, and we will have to wait and see whether it manages to bounce back.

It may be too early to write off Tokyo for its response just yet. But whether officials can learn lessons from this debacle in the run-up to the Summer Olympics is another matter altogether.

Dr Rupakjyoti Borah is a senior research fellow with the Japan Forum for Strategic Studies, Tokyo. The views expressed in this article are personal

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