Photo/Illutration Pedestrians cross an intersection in the Shibuya district of Tokyo. (Hiroyuki Yamamoto)

Two-thirds of Japan’s prefectures are experiencing an explosion of novel coronavirus infections, and a health ministry panel warned that the COVID-19 situation was approaching the level of a “natural disaster.”

Nationwide, a daily record 15,812 new COVID-19 cases were reported as of 9 p.m. on Aug. 11. Nine prefectures, mainly in western Japan, posted record high daily tallies.

The number of COVID-19 patients with serious symptoms was 1,332 on Aug. 10, up by 102 from the previous day.

According to guidelines used by experts to classify infection-spread levels, 31 of Japan’s 47 prefectures were at the most serious stage 4, which indicates an “explosive growth” in infections.

At an Aug. 11 meeting, the panel advising the health ministry in dealing with the pandemic pointed out that the sharp increase in new cases was fueling the rise in COVID-19 patients with serious symptoms as well as those waiting at home for a hospital bed to open up.

A record high 19,396 infected patients around Japan on Aug. 11 were waiting for an open hospital bed. A man in his 30s who was showing mild symptoms died from COVID-19 the same day.

The panel recommended that residents refrain from outings and travel across prefectural borders during the Bon holiday season, noting that a crisis situation could arise, resulting in many deaths.

For the one-week period until Aug. 10, there were 77.6 new COVID-19 cases per 100,000 residents, a 1.33-fold increase over the previous week.

The experts’ panel has set 25 cases per 100,000 residents as the cutoff line for designating a prefecture as being in stage 4, but 31 prefectures had exceeded that figure.

Even in prefectures covered by pre-emergency measures, the figure rose over the previous week.

Moreover, the ratio of occupied hospital beds set aside for COVID-19 patients exceeded 50 percent in 16 prefectures.

Among the prefectures with extremely high ratios were Okinawa at 86.3 percent, Shiga at 81 percent, Fukushima at 79.2 percent and Kanagawa at 69.1 percent.

According to studies by the Tokyo Metropolitan Institute of Medical Science, pedestrian traffic in the capital decreased by 4.5 percent between 6 p.m. and midnight in the major entertainment districts in comparison to the previous week.

But the level of pedestrian traffic has not fallen to the lowest level recorded during the third state of emergency in Tokyo declared in late April.

And pedestrian traffic between 10 p.m. and midnight actually increased by 3.2 percent over the previous week.

The more virulent Delta variant has also continued to spread rapidly in not only the Kanto region but also the Kansai region.

A study by the National Institute of Infectious Diseases found that about 90 percent of the cases in the Kanto region and about 80 percent of the cases in the Kansai region could be traced to the Delta variant.

According to preliminary statistics for June compiled by the health ministry, 5,387 unvaccinated senior citizens became infected, and 232, or 4.31 percent, died.

In contrast, of the 112 seniors who became infected even after two vaccine jabs, only one, or 0.89 percent, died.

Despite the positive news about the effects of the ongoing vaccination program, the Aug. 11 experts’ panel meeting was filled with gloomy predictions.

Hiroshi Nishiura, a professor of theoretical epidemiology at Kyoto University, said if the current pace of new infections continues, Tokyo would have more than 10,000 new cases a day by late August, and the figure could approach 20,000 by early September.

Other experts warned against optimism over a declining number of COVID-19 cases during the Bon holiday season. They said the lower infection numbers would be a result of a decrease in testing.

“The number of new cases will appear to be falling, but will again increase thereafter,” said Kazuhiro Tateda, a professor of infectious diseases at Toho University. “There are no factors that give hope for a continual decrease.”

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