Japan will ease its COVID-19 border controls further from March 14, raising the daily cap on entrants from overseas to 7,000 from the current 5,000, Prime Minister Fumio Kishida says.
Japan is considering extending the COVID-19 quasi-state of emergency once again for Tokyo and nine prefectures beyond the scheduled end date of March 6, government sources say.
Japan plans to extend COVID-19 quasi-emergency measures in 16 prefectures including Osaka, Kyoto and Fukuoka beyond Feb. 20 to early March to curb coronavirus infections, Prime Minister Fumio Kishida says.
The cumulative COVID-19 death toll in Japan has topped 20,000, with the figure on a rising trend in recent weeks amid the sixth wave of infections driven by the highly transmissible Omicron variant, a Kyodo News tally shows.
The Japanese government is set to extend the COVID-19 quasi-state of emergency for Tokyo and 12 other prefectures for about three weeks from its scheduled end this weekend as Japan struggles to stem the spread of the highly transmissible Omicron variant, government sources say.