95 people confirmed as infected with COVID-19 at Chiba welfare facility for the disabled

Written with extracts translated from NHK

March 31st 2020

CHIBA – Chiba Prefecture has announced that two new families of staff members have been infected at the Hokuso Nursery Garden, a welfare facility for persons with disabilities in Higashisho, where outbreaks of the new coronavirus had already been confirmed. Ninety-five people involved in the facilities where the infection was confirmed, indicating that 70% of the residents are infected.

It has been confirmed that 93 people involved in the facility, including residents and staff, have been infected with the new coronavirus at the Hokuso Nursery Garden in Higashisho Town.

About 60% of the infected people have no symptoms, and 10 staff members live outside the prefecture.

An examination of 70 residents and 67 staff members was completed, and it was found that 70% of the residents and half of the staff members were infected.

According to Chiba Prefecture, up to now, four residents at the facility have been diagnosed and transported to a medical institution. Doctors continue to monitor the situation so that the resident’s symptoms do not become more severe, and virus tests on the family members of the staff continue to be carried out.

It was found that more than half of the residents at this facility did not have daily temperature readings. Chiba Prefecture states, “If we measure everyone, we may have been able to grasp the situation a little earlier.”

So far, the facility has explained that “20 residents had fever all at once on the 27th of this month”, but as a result of the prefecture hearing, about 40 or more of the 70 residents were not having their temperature checked daily.

Every day, only 30 people, such as those whose physical condition was easily changed, measured the temperature, and only 40 were measured when there was a change in physical condition.

On the March 27, most of the people who were measuring body temperature had a fever, so it was found that 20 people were found to have a fever when all were taken.

It is said that the facility explained that “It took only one hour to measure 30 people and it was difficult for all staff members to measure the temperature during the night shift.”

The prefecture stated, “Speaking about the results, it may have been possible to grasp the spread of the infection a little sooner if everyone’s body temperature was measured,” and decided to further investigate whether the health management of residents and staff was performed properly.