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Why is Japan still a coronavirus outlier?

japantimes.co.jp

141–150 of 430 posts

Re: Why is Japan still a coronavirus outlier?

#141
post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most of the textile industry has moved to Asia in the last 30 years.

This is such an important point and so widely misunderstood. I feel like most Americans, when talking about the loss of US manufacturing, think of Ohio, Indiana, and other "rust belt" states, when the reality is, a huge amount of textile production centering on the east coast, from furniture manufacturing in North Carolina, to paper mills and cotton processing down to Atlanta, is gone. My working theory is that it's…

> My working theory is that it's because those places are national election battleground states. Just kind of shocking when you realize there are 30-40K coal miners in the entire US, not even a Google worth of people, let alone a midsize city, and this small group is deciding our elections?

Unfortunately, you just discovered the unjust math of "popular" elections. This is the reason for a paradox why people like TD have such success winning elections in countries with plurality voting.

Small, but extremely zealous coherent voting blocks consistently outmatch, a wide, but piecemeal support across many diverse groups.

Re: Why is Japan still a coronavirus outlier?

#142
post #7
post #2

In South Korea epidemic was started with one sick cult member spreading it to wast number of people. In Italy the person who started Lombardy cluster was first asymptomatic for weeks, was later misdiagnosed and spreading the disease in hospital. It seems that the epidemic is starting without similar super-spreaders in Japan. Case fatality deaths to recovered rate in Japan is 18%. In South Korea it's 6.6%. This might…

There were 30 or so cases before the Shincheonji contagion, in which, yes, one cult member single-handedly tripled the number of cases in one day. But at the usual 33% per day intra-country contagion rate, even single-handedly tripling the number of cases only moves the calendar forward by about 4 days. I do agree that Japan probably has diagnosed a much smaller proportion of cases.

IIRC, there were no new case or low single digit cases for almost a full week before the ShinCheonJi outbreak, after which the number of cases increased to three digits new cases per day.

Re: Why is Japan still a coronavirus outlier?

#143
post #138
post #78

Not so surprising. You have also the same outliers with Hong Kong and Taiwan. - In Japan, people naturally respect social distancing. Touching someone is considered rude, everyone bows instead of shaking hands and nobody kiss. - Almost everybody wear mask when they are sick to avoid contaminating others. They do that since way before Cornavirus and on voluntary based. - Washing hands is common, being clean (bath cult…

- Almost everybody wear mask when they are sick to avoid contaminating others. They do that since way before Cornavirus and on voluntary based. We're told that masks do not work

Nobody should be saying that masks do not work. When worn by a sick person, they very effectively prevent droplets from leaving the mouth. They also help not breathing in contamination, as airborne viruses are usually contained in droplets. But there are other ways to get infected, so they don't help as much as people think they do.

Re: Why is Japan still a coronavirus outlier?

#144
post #5

> New tests that produce produce results in 10-15 minutes are becoming available, but even with the improved tech, under the current policy a test will only be administered in the most extreme circumstances, when people have had a fever for four days or more . This is an important factor that may indicate this "outlier" is more of a delay, rather than a reality of some exception. As a resident, I'm quite concerned ab…

Finnish health officials have said that they do not plan on implementing lower barrier testing. They made a few points about testing.

* Those who can weather corona at home do not benefit from testing.

* Performing the test requires the same protective equipment as treating corona patients and there's already shortages on those worldwide.

* Performing the tests requires some of the same people, who could be actually treating corona patients.

Re: Why is Japan still a coronavirus outlier?

#145
I'm getting tired of all the Coronavirus news. Did anyone realize that Bernie Sanders's campaign is over and now it's just Trump and Biden left? When I found that out, I thought it was fake news. But Googling around, it seems that his campaign is really on the rocks. WTF! Why is no one talking about that news???

Oh wait I know...

Re: Why is Japan still a coronavirus outlier?

#146
post #2

In South Korea epidemic was started with one sick cult member spreading it to wast number of people. In Italy the person who started Lombardy cluster was first asymptomatic for weeks, was later misdiagnosed and spreading the disease in hospital. It seems that the epidemic is starting without similar super-spreaders in Japan. Case fatality deaths to recovered rate in Japan is 18%. In South Korea it's 6.6%. This might…

Notably, there's a big difference between South Korea - which seems to largely have largely gotten the epidemic under control, and Italy where it seems to be totally out of control despite a severe lockdown. Whats a key difference between South Korea and Italy? Widespread use of face masks.

>Whats a key difference between South Korea and Italy? Widespread use of face masks.

Gonna wager a guess that there are vast amount of differences between South Korea and Italy that could affect the spread of a virus.

Re: Why is Japan still a coronavirus outlier?

#147
post #138
post #78

Not so surprising. You have also the same outliers with Hong Kong and Taiwan. - In Japan, people naturally respect social distancing. Touching someone is considered rude, everyone bows instead of shaking hands and nobody kiss. - Almost everybody wear mask when they are sick to avoid contaminating others. They do that since way before Cornavirus and on voluntary based. - Washing hands is common, being clean (bath cult…

- Almost everybody wear mask when they are sick to avoid contaminating others. They do that since way before Cornavirus and on voluntary based. We're told that masks do not work

This should not be downvoted. There have been plenty of articles downplaying the importance of masks.

Re: Why is Japan still a coronavirus outlier?

#148
post #82
post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To elaborate, yes Japanese are pretty clean by nature and do have social distancing naturally, but everyone is still taking the subway, the government has not cracked down much. Ubiquitous wearing of masks is the only really unique thing i can think of. (Actually even now not everyone is wearing them, but its still a good percentage and as soon as Japanese feel sick they wear masks) So I’ve come to the conclusion tha…

Riding the subway doesn't make you sick. Not washing your hands and then touching your face with hands that have the virus from touching parts of the train makes you sick. You can't touch your face much if you have a mask on it. The virus doesn't just float around in the air. It only exists in water particles that fall quickly onto surfaces.

This is commonly believed, but how do we know how true it is?

If breathing particles into your throat and lungs is the primary vector (seems likely to me, although I don’t know exactly what is), then what you are saying is wrong.

It seems that masks are being de-emphasised, based on the obvious fake reason of saving the retail stock for the front-line workers (how does avoiding buying retail stock magically get masks into hands of nurses?).

It also seems to me there is an over emphasis on washing hands, and avoiding touching your face (well mouth, nose or eyes). That could be one vector (although unlikely to be the main vector) yet why is everyone so hyper focused on it like it’s the critical vector? It’s the emphasis on washing and touching I find disturbing (even though obviously we should wash hands and avoid touching holes).

Re: Why is Japan still a coronavirus outlier?

#149
post #78

Not so surprising. You have also the same outliers with Hong Kong and Taiwan. - In Japan, people naturally respect social distancing. Touching someone is considered rude, everyone bows instead of shaking hands and nobody kiss. - Almost everybody wear mask when they are sick to avoid contaminating others. They do that since way before Cornavirus and on voluntary based. - Washing hands is common, being clean (bath cult…

- People do shake hands in Japan. In Western countries hand-shaking is limited almost exclusively to business (I’d imagine the same goes for Japan).

- Washing hands is common, but not necessarily any more of a practice than in Western countries. But in many places like in subway station bathrooms they do not have soap.

Some of the cultural things like mask wearing (which was born out of the density and close proximity in public transit) are shared between Hong Kong, Taiwan, and other Asian countries, but a lot of things are also different culturally so I don’t think you can easily attribute these reasons as “not surprising” with regards to coronavirus growth.

Re: Why is Japan still a coronavirus outlier?

#150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have heard the same from a Japanese friend, not in a major city either. Seems even families are going about normally with their children, to McDonald's and such.

What they're not doing is sending their children to school. Maybe that intervention alone is enough to suppress it.

I heard that because school is out the young people just went out instead.
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