Photo/Illutration The famed scramble crossing in Tokyo’s Shibuya district is bustling even in the evening on July 28. (Wataru Sekita)

Tokyo’s daily average of new COVID-19 cases over the week through Aug. 11 could see an “unprecedentedly explosive” growth, hitting 4,532, experts warned on July 29.

The estimated figure was presented that day at a meeting of the Tokyo metropolitan government’s expert panel monitoring the spread of the novel coronavirus in the capital.

Experts at the meeting called for a need to quickly respond to the situation to prevent infections from continuing to increase at the current pace.

They also said the number of patients hospitalized with COVID-19 has doubled over the month, already placing a heavy strain on the health care system.

The capital’s daily average of new infection cases over the week through July 28 was 1,936, up 1.53 times from the 1,268 recorded a week earlier, according to data shared at the meeting.

Norio Omagari, director of the Disease Control and Prevention Center under the National Center for Global Health and Medicine, estimated that the figure will reach 2,962 on Aug. 4 and 4,532 on Aug. 11 if infections keep rising at the current pace.

“That will put the health care system at risk of collapse, so we must act quickly to avert it (the scenario),” he said.

The panel also reported that the highly contagious Delta variant was responsible for 46.3 percent of new infections confirmed by diagnostic tests conducted in Tokyo over the week through July 18. The figure was up from 30.6 percent a week earlier.

“Tokyo will face an explosive growth in infections if it fails to sufficiently reduce the flow of people and allows infections from the Delta variant to further replace those from other strains of the virus,” Omagari said.

Data presented at the meeting also showed that 3,039 people were hospitalized with COVID-19 in the capital as of July 29, double the figure from a month ago.

The panel also noted that the metropolitan government received 270 requests a day from local public health centers over the week through July 28 to find hospitals that could take in COVID-19 patients. The figure jumped from the 184 recorded a week earlier.

Officials had difficulty arranging hospitalizations, particularly during the four-day holiday weekend that ended on July 25, forcing many patients to wait at home, according to Masataka Inokuchi, vice chair of the Tokyo Medical Association.

He said the situation has remained the same even after the weekend and that it will likely become even more difficult for officials to make arrangements for patients’ hospitalizations.

(This article was written by Rihito Karube and Yuki Okado.)

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