Free COVID-19 PCR Tests Funded by The Nippon Foundation for Tokyo Area Caregivers Top 5-Million Mark
About a year ago, The Nippon Foundation launched a project to offer caregivers and other essential workers at elderly nursing homes in Tokyo and the three neighboring prefectures free and regular polymerase chain reaction (PCR) tests for the novel coronavirus. This was part of our campaign to help the nation combat the COVID-19 pandemic.
As of February 12, 2022, the number of PCR tests administered on these caregivers came to 5,033,016, surpassing the 5-million mark for the first time since the project started on February 24, 2021. Of the total, 3,731 persons or 0.074% were found positive.
In December last year, the number of positive cases found in our testing remained at almost zero. Only four persons tested positive for six days between December 31 and January 5. But with the highly contagious Omicron variant spreading fast across Japan, the number of positive cases surged to more than 100 per day in late January and 200 in early February.
As I noted in my previous posts, I cannot overstate the importance of PCR testing, along with vaccination, as the key to containing COVID-19. The Japanese government has finally started to administer free PCR tests targeting people with no symptoms.
According to the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare, the number of new positive cases in Japan has been trending lower after hitting a daily high of 100,275 on February 1, but remained high with the daily average for the week ending on February 26 standing at 67,437. Besides, daily COVID-related deaths have risen above 200 since mid-February, reaching a high of 272 on February 22.
I sincerely hope the government will continue its campaign to encourage people to get tested. I believe that we need to receive a PCR test on a regular basis, ideally once a week.
The followings are details of the foundation’s PCR testing project on caregivers at elderly nursing homes in Tokyo and the three nearby prefectures between December 31, 2021, and February 12, 2022.
