Intensive COVID testing at Japan’s nursing care facilities

From NHK World

February 7 2021

The Japanese government has asked ten prefectures under its coronavirus state of emergency to launch an intensive coronavirus testing campaign at elderly care facilities. The action is in response to the growing number of cluster infections at such facilities.

The health ministry has told the prefectures to first sound out which nursing care facilities want testing and submit a testing plan by next Friday.

Testing plans should include the period of testing and whether residents of nursing care facilities will be included, in addition to the staff.

The ministry says the government plans to shoulder all the costs of testing.

It says it expects testing will be completed by the end of next month and that the prefectures will report the results to the ministry.

The ministry has confirmed 261 cluster infections and infections of two or more people in one place during the seven days through February 1.

More than a third of those infections, or 95, occurred at nursing care facilities.

It says in many cases staff infected residents.

Tochigi Prefecture is not included, as the emergency declaration for the prefecture will have been lifted by the end of Sunday.