The war epidemic is in the national mind. Japan's anti-epidemic myths.

. WHO data show that as of June 9, Japan's
Xinguan pneumonia
confirmed more than 17,000 confirmed cases, the day of the new case of 36, this is the sixth day of daily new cases less than 50 - unwittingly, Japan has passed the peak of the outbreak, ushered in the end of the outbreak.

look back on the past, Japan's epidemic data once "smooth", in the United States, Europe and other countries confirmed and the death toll continues to rise, Japan has been "turtle speed rise", become a strange scenein in the international epidemic situation.

the first confirmed case in Japan on January 16, followed by a slowly climbing in the number of new diagnoses, but as of March 22nd, the number had not exceeded 100.

entering April, when the number of new diagnoses peaked at 743, it slipped - falling below 100 on May 16th and below 50 on June 4th.

screenshot 2020-06-10 am 11.54.51.png, the outbreak period in Japan is probably maintained between March 21 and April 11

accompanied by a relatively flat outbreak curve, is the outside world of the Japanese government testing low, unable to respond to the real situation of the doubt. Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has publicly acknowledged that The number of

infections in Japan is higher than the number of confirmed cases, but the exact number is not known.but if the number of

infected can be concealed, the death toll is not hidden? Zhang Wenhong, a domestic control expert, has said that the case of infectious diseases who also "cannot hide", because someone will die, it will always be exposed.

Japan's death figures are also "positive": since the first case of death son-in-law on February 13, the number of new deaths in Japan has not exceeded 100 today, reaching 91 on April 22nd, and the figure has dropped to 0 in the last two days.

screenshot 2020-06-10 5.31.47.png

even if the data can be covered up, but the behavior of the people will not be false, and the Japanese government does not have the ability to completely control domestic public opinion, nor can doctors across the country systematically conceal and fake. But there is no information in Japan at the moment, even if the news indicates widespread panic in the country due to the outbreak.

another perspective to observe is that the scale of nearly a million, accounting for 1% of Japan's resident population of overseas Chinese in Japan, if the situation in Japan is more serious than imagined, according to the proportion of Japanese Chinese will also have a certain number of infections, the news will inevitably reach the domestic. But at present, in addition to the panic, there are not many confirmed cases out of Japan.

information that makes it impossible for onlookers to understand the myths beyond their forgiven doubts. Has the Japanese outbreak really "landed safely"? What exactly did the Japanese government and the people do to make the new crown virus so "friendly" to Japan?

how much
the Japanese government's Buddhist resistance is
first said, Japan's controversial testing problem.

As early as the end of January, the Japanese government designated the new crown pneumonia as a "designated infectious disease" in accordance with the Infectious Diseases Law, and the
diagnosis and treatment of the new crown pneumonia
must also be carried out in accordance with the relevant procedures of the statutory infectious diseases.

On February 25th Japan announced the basic guidelines for responding to the outbreak - with the goal of "controlling the spread of infection as much as possible and minimizing the number of serious and dead cases", requiring, in principle, home rest for patients with minor illness, strengthening health observation of close contacts, and improving medical resources and systems centered on critical treatment. This policy is basically in line with the response tone of the early outbreak in Wuhan and the early stage of the outbreak in the United States.

, doctors have a greater say in determining whether the patient needs to be tested for nucleic acid, and it is the first barrier to identify suspected cases.

if doctors suspect the patient as a suspected patient, they will report it to the local health care clinic and issue a referral certificate requiring the patient to go to the National Institute of Infectious Diseases for virus testing. In Japan, the doctor's judgment standard is relatively harsh: must have clinically suspected symptoms, such as fever 37.5 degrees or more, upper respiratory symptoms more than 4 days, 65 years of age and older people have symptoms more than 2 days, CT shows the lungs have shadows and so on.

rigorous testing standards have left a large number of applicants out of the scope of the test. According to data released by the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, before March 20, more than 230,000 people voluntarily applied for testing, and eventually doctors were screened to finally be able to get tests, but 7,659 people, the approval rate of only 3.3%. There has been speculation that there may be a large number of missed cases of viral infections.

as of March 13, Japan's cumulative testing has reached only 20,000 people, while South Korea has tested 260,000 people. By early June, the number of tests in Japan had just exceeded 300,000.

"less detection, so fewconfirmed cases" thus also become the biggest impression of Japan's epidemic prevention and control.in addition to the difficult testing, the Japanese government in the "reduce contact, isolation of the virus" in the action is always "slow half shot."

at the beginning of the outbreak, Japan mainly resorted to border quarantine to try to "keep the virus out of the country." After the first case on January 15, Japan only advised its citizens not to travel to Hubei Province on the 24th, but did not restrict the entry of Chinese or even Hubei tourists, which also infected some of the first tourism workers who received Chinese tourists.

Japan banned people from Hubei province from entering the country until February 1, nearly 10 days after Wuhan sealed the city. 13, the ban was extended to Zhejiang province and not until March 5, when it was extended to all Chinese citizens. You know, the United States banned foreigners with Chinese travel history from entering the country as early as February 2.

at that time, Europeans and Americans were still free to enter and leave Japan, but at that time the outbreak in China has been effectively controlled, the United States, Europe is in a rapid outbreak period. The Japanese government's restrictions on Europe and the United States are once again "belated": on March 26th it required U.S. and Japanese personnel, including Japanese citizens, to be quarantined for two weeks and to avoid using public transport facilities in Japan;

but soon, Japan's Minister of Health, Labour and Welfare, Kato, explained that the move to require quarantine of immigrants from China and South Korea was not a measure under the Quarantine Act or the Infectious Diseases Act, "in the final analysis, a requirement" and not mandatory.

such slow and loose "out of the world" measures, inevitably caused the spread of the Japanese epidemic community - since March 21, the cumulative number of confirmed cases in Japan exceeded 1000, the new number of confirmed cases began to accelerate the upward.

soon, the number of confirmed cases on April 7 nearly 4000, the rapid number of cases so that Japan finally declared Tokyo, Osaka Prefecture and other 7 places into the "emergency situation", and on the 16th declared a state of emergency area extended to the whole country, and the total number of confirmed cases has exceeded 10,000.

declared an "emergency" the main goal is to reduce the number of human contact seventy-eight percent, thereby reducing the spread of infection. After the state of emergency, local governments have issued specific policies to require the people's lives of non-essential industries to suspend business, and called on the public to reduce unnecessary outings, enterprise su-telecom, etc., to avoid "closed, intensive, close contact" of the "three close" behavior.but whether it's home isolation, masks worn by people with symptoms or telecommuting, Japanese words are just "calls" and "requests" and are not mandatory. "In Japan, these acts are private, not public, and the government has no right to interfere." Sang Zeyong-hui, who lives in Yokohama and is studying for a Ph.D., told the health community that this was determined by the realities of Japan's small government and largesociety.

can imagine that for this non-mandatory appeal, there will always be some residents due to information asymmetry and other reasons difficult to comply with. On May 1st, the vice-chairman of the Expert Meeting on the New Crown Virus Countermeasures, Nagano, publicly stated that there was still a gap between regions and age groups for the goal of reducing contact sharply by 80 per cent. how well does the

the Japanese government's anti-epidemic materials reserve and dispatch? Confirmed cases are rising rapidly, and many places have been exposed to the shortage of empty beds, masks and protective clothing.

one is to rent hotels for minor patients to stay, and the other is to personally distribute cloth masks to the people since April 17, each can receive two. However, according to Japanese media reports, as of the 27th, more than 400 local self-government has reported that pregnant women's special masks have quality problems, has been identified as many as 30,000 inferior products. Problems include yellowing of masks, smells of smells, black stains, and mixed hairs and other dirt. The issuance of these masks had to be temporarily suspended.

netizens have been flirting, the only one is a bit of practical use of the policy, but also because of the quality of the problem without a disease.

economic development is king


in economic development, the Japanese government's response seems to be more "reliable".Japan's gross domestic product (GDP) was negative 3.4% in the first quarter of 2020, according to the latest economic data released by the Japanese government. The second quarter is even worse, with a contraction of 6 to 7 per cent, according to Shina Yigui, chief economist at Japan's First Life Economics Institute.

and a survey by Tokyo Shoko Research, a Japanese credit research firm, showed that the number of bankruptcies in Japan was rising as a result of the outbreak, with the most affected sectors being accommodation, restaurants and clothing.

a state of emergency, the Japanese government submitted two supplementary budgets to the National Assembly in late April and early May to help individuals and businesses cope with the impact of the outbreak, totalling more than 20 billion yen. The first round focuses on families and individuals, while the second round focuses on strengthening employment and reducing corporate capital turnover.

specific measures include: 100,000 yen in cash per person, a one-time subsidy of 200,000 yen to front-line health care workers;

the Japanese government has even added a new mechanism for injecting capital directly into companies, injecting capital directly into companies through policy investment banks, including by buying subprime loans or voting preference shares.

in fact, the Japanese government's early reluctance to adopt measures such as strict immigration controls and domestic social dislocation was fundamentally feared that the economy would suffer.With the peak of the epidemic past, the number of new confirmed cases continued to decrease, on May 25, Japan officially lifted the "emergency declaration" in the capital circle of four prefectures and Hokkaido, including Tokyo, japan's epidemic response has also entered a new stage - gradually restore the level of socio-economic activities in stages, while further improving the efficiency of the medical system, sampling antibody testing, etc., to prevent a second wave of outbreaks.

the key to the fight against the epidemic may not be in the governmentjust mentioned that Japan is a small government society, the government and the people have a relatively clear line, the government can do very limited things. In the prevention and control of the epidemic, The role of Japan's "small government" may not be comparable to that of the "big society".

first of all, Japan has a mature system of graded
diagnosis and treatment
. In Japan, there are a large number of small clinics that form the first level of prevention and control of the outbreak in Japan.

Japanese medical institutions are divided into large state or private general hospitals and private clinics deep into the community. According to the Japan Health System Assessment Report, published in 2018 by WHO,016, there were 8,442 hospitals and 101,529 clinics in Japan as of 2016 - about the same number of 7-11 convenience stores across Japan.

, the general hospital almost does not accept direct to the hospital for initial consultation, the public appears with the relevant symptoms, first go to the nearest clinic away from home, and then the clinic decides whether to transfer to the general hospital. "The professionalism of Japanese clinics is guaranteed and does not feel any fundamental difference from the large public hospitals." Mr. Sun, who works in Tokyo, has told the media that Japanese people usually go to the clinic nearby, which is very convenient.

a large number of primary clinics formed the first line of defense for suspected patients, effectively preventing suspected patients into the hospital caused by cross-infection and medical runs, is A major advantage for Japan to deal with the new crown outbreak.

second, is the Japanese good health and living habits and the face of disaster-facing positive attitude.

wash hands frequently, disinfect liquid, meal-sharing system, environmental cleansing these are already the daily life of the Japanese people. More crucially, the Japanese are the only people in the world who like to wear masks all year round: many women usually wear masks to mask their faces, don't bother to wear make-up, or shade the sun.

" especially the winter and spring is the flu season, the end of January and early February pollen began again, more than 60% of the Japanese people even if there is no outbreak will wear masks. Ji Yonghuishi, director of the Huishi Clinic in Tokyo, told the media.

, the Japanese people's original habits have maintained a certain "social distance." Unlike the pasta hugs in Europe and the United States and the human-friendly handshakes, the Japanese are more accustomed to bowing to each other; in public places, the Japanese are used to whispering or even keeping quiet; Japan does not have large-scale religious gatherings like those in South Korea, where japan's elderly people do not live with young people, have smaller families, and even Japanese is a make.