Japan Hit by Out-of-Season Spread of Influenza

Tokyo, May 26 (Jiji Press)--Japan has been hit by the out-of-season spread of influenza as government data Friday showed the number of patients remained above the threshold of 1.0 per hospital that indicates an outbreak.

The health ministry said the average number of flu patients reported by regularly monitored hospitals across the country in the week through Sunday came to 1.89, up around 1.4-fold from a week earlier and five times from the same period in 2019, before the COVID-19 pandemic.

It is extremely rare for Japan to experience a flu outbreak in May.

Around 500 students came down with flu at high schools in the southwestern cities of Oita and Miyazaki in mid-May, leading to temporary school closures. Flu has also caused class closures at schools throughout the country.

There was no significant number of flu cases during the COVID-19 pandemic.

[Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]