[Asia Economy Reporter Ki-min Lee] The Yomiuri Shimbun reported on the 11th that a large number of COVID-19 confirmed cases were omitted in the announcement from Tokyo Metropolis (東京都), which has the highest number of confirmed cases in Japan.
According to the report, multiple health centers made numerous errors such as double counting or omitting cases while reporting the status of confirmed cases to Tokyo Metropolis.
Tokyo Metropolis announced that as of the 10th, the cumulative number of confirmed cases in Tokyo was 4,868, but during the process of re-tallying confirmed cases, an omission of about 100 cases was identified, the Yomiuri Shimbun reported.
One of the causes cited was the lack of a unified tally system, with some health centers manually reporting confirmed cases that were initially entered into terminals. Regarding this, Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike (小池百合子) stated in a video briefing on the afternoon of the same day, "There was a total of 111 cases omitted in reports from health centers within the jurisdiction," and added that multiple errors such as duplicate entries were also confirmed, and a detailed investigation into the circumstances is underway.
Governor Koike explained, "We created a center to manage everything from symptom onset to care in an integrated manner, and during the process of thoroughly reviewing past data, omissions in reporting were revealed." She added that going forward, they will strengthen cooperation with the central government and health centers to ensure accurate information is delivered promptly.
The Yomiuri Shimbun analyzed that frontline health centers are burdened with many tasks beyond managing confirmed case information, such as responding to COVID-19 related consultation calls and investigating infection routes, and that the increased workload may have caused omissions in tallying confirmed cases.
Meanwhile, Shigeru Omi (尾身茂), Chairperson of the Regional Medical Function Promotion Organization and Vice-Chair of the Japanese government's COVID-19 expert panel, appealed at the House of Councillors Budget Committee on the same day, saying, "Because there are many mild or asymptomatic cases, it is difficult to grasp the total number of infections in Japan with the current testing system."
In response to a question about whether the number of infections in Japan, which has exceeded 15,000 reported cases, might actually be over 100,000, he said, "It is certain that the number of infections is higher than reported, but no one knows whether it is 10 times, 20 times, or 30 times more," and added, "Statistically, it is possible, but it is impossible to determine, so I cannot answer."
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