Photo/Illutration Itochu Corp. started a workplace vaccination effort against the novel coronavirus at its Tokyo headquarters on Feb. 17. (Hideaki Sato)

Tokyo logged 10,517 new COVID-19 cases on March 4, 608 fewer than the previous Friday, metropolitan health officials said.

The latest count brought the daily average of new cases over the week through March 4 in the capital to 11,255.6, representing 95.4 percent of the figure for the preceding week.

Tokyo officials also reported 27 deaths linked to COVID-19. The 27 people were men or women in their 60s to 100 or older.

Of the 10,517 new cases, 478 were diagnosed with COVID-19 by doctors without undergoing tests.

The age group with the highest number of new cases was people in their 30s with 1,820, followed by 1,816 among children under the age of 10. 

In addition, there were 1,795 cases among people in their 40s, 1,773 among those in their 20s, 1,299 among youths aged 10 to 19 and 944 among people in their 50s as well as 807 among those aged 65 or older.

The occupancy rate of hospital beds set aside for COVID-19 patients in the capital stood at 48.9 percent as of March 4.

The occupancy rate of hospital beds reserved for seriously ill coronavirus patients was 26.6 percent on March 3. The Tokyo metropolitan government has announced that it would consider asking the central government to declare a state of emergency for the capital if the rate reaches 30 to 40 percent.

The number of serious cases was unchanged from the day before at 70. The Tokyo metropolitan government defines patients in serious condition as those requiring ventilators or ECMO heart-lung bypass machines.

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