Japan ranks 9th in the world in terms of Covid resilience, and its “difficult” road to fighting the epidemic

According to recent statistics released by Bloomberg on the 1st, Japan ranked 9th in the Covid Resilience Ranking of 53 economies , while China ranked 6th.

But Japan itself does not seem to be optimistic about its ranking, and its fight against the epidemic is also quite " difficult "!

The first vaccine waste incident occurred

First, the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare of Japan issued a statement on the 1st saying that according to reports from medical institutions, the refrigerator used to store the new crown vaccine malfunctioned on February 26, causing 172 bottles of vaccine to be out of ultra-low temperature storage and unusable.

This batch of vaccines, totaling about 1,032 doses, has now all been scrapped . This is also the first case of waste of COVID-19 vaccines in Japan.

Secondly, according to the country's vaccination schedule, 4.7 million medical workers will be vaccinated starting in March, and then 36 million people over the age of 65 will be vaccinated starting on April 12.

However, at this juncture of vaccination, in addition to the pig teammates "wasting vaccines", the elderly who were given priority for vaccination were also not buying it. Nearly half of the elderly said they were not optimistic about vaccination.

More than 40% of elderly Japanese surveyed recently said they were unsure whether they would receive a coronavirus vaccine, suggesting many are wary of getting the shot. That contrasts with more than half of South Koreans who said getting vaccinated was a social responsibility.

Although many politicians and medical personnel have taken the lead in accepting the new crown vaccine, nearly half of the respondents still expressed concerns about side effects and doubts about the effectiveness of the vaccine. After all, as of March 1, there have been 152 reports of adverse reactions after vaccination in South Korea. (Jung Eun-kyung, director of the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said that adverse reactions are normal reactions that may occur in the process of forming immunity in the body, and the symptoms will disappear naturally within 3 days.)

Vaccinations are all purchased

While Europe, the United States and China were working overtime to develop the new coronavirus vaccine and achieved initial results, Japan gave up treatment early and placed its hopes on Europe, the United States and other countries with which it had good relations, and was ready to pay.

A third batch of Pfizer Inc.'s COVID-19 vaccine arrives in Tokyo from Belgium on March 1, 2021.

(Photo source: Kyodo News)

In the current situation of economic downturn, Japan is also a little overwhelmed by the huge cost and difficulty in producing vaccine research and development. It may be a more cost-effective deal to pay for vaccines from Europe and the United States, which are richer and more powerful than itself.

As a country with a large population ( 127 million people, ranking the world's first), but only a small country in terms of land resources, Japan has been blamed for its poor response to the pandemic, but the Japanese government has indeed invested huge amounts of money, manpower and material resources in the face of the pandemic. Through three states of emergency, it has also effectively curbed the worsening of the pandemic, and this achievement cannot be ignored.

However, with the news that Japan plans to completely end the state of emergency on March 7, coupled with the increase in infections of the mutant coronavirus in Kobe City in western Japan, the future direction of the epidemic in Japan has once again become unknown!

Epidemic in Japan

vaccine

State of emergency