Doctors denounce continued COVID restrictions at Japan's hospitals

"Not being able to see family members in their final days is a human rights violation. The disadvantages are far greater than the advantages," he said.

In many aspects in Japan, family just being considered not exist at all. Try to look Japanese corporate, do their schedule reflect of their worker really have family?

Much of the world may have moved on from the coronavirus pandemic, but a painful legacy lingers in Japan: hospitals continuing to restrict patient visitations, even in the case of people wishing to see terminally ill loved ones.

This is Japan, to change that rule even silly one, it will need another decade to do that.

Absolutely ludicrous that this was ever a thing let alone still a thing in the glacially slow Japan!

Japan appears to be stuck in time.

You can say that again.

These rules are over-the-top but Japan was lucky to escape most of the "rule contagion" that spread in other G7 countries.

All COVID-19 restrictions should have been long gone.

@proxy

These rules are over-the-top but Japan was lucky to escape most of the "rule contagion" that spread in other G7 countries.

During just refused Covid many hospitals in Japan refused Covid patient

https://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20210301/p2a/00m/0na/025000c

.

However at the same time government provide discount for citizen to travel around Japan

https://www.asahi.com/ajw/articles/14726573

More people travel during covid that means more people will get infected right? By JGovt logic, no.

Hope this gains traction. Definitely ridiculous at this point.

@sakurasuki

Many governments went way, way too far but at least Japan did not go crazy enough to accept vaccine passports.

To the hospitals and institutions clinging to this wholly unscientific nonsense, this is simply about obedience, like it always ways. COVID was downgraded to the same level as the flu two years ago (three years too late). We now have five years of data, natural immunity, declining severity, and still - some bureaucrats in white coats are telling you that you can't hold your mother’s hand while she passes away?

The tragedy here is how these institutions refuse to admit they were WRONG. They locked people in rooms, denied care based on experimental intravenous "medicine" status, and traumatized entire generations in the name of "safety." And now they’re clinging to the script, terrified of losing control and accountability.

To the hospitals doing this: you’ve FAILED. Spectacularly. Not just in science, but in basic human decency. And to anyone still getting upset over “seasonal waves” of a glorified cold: grow up, take your vitamins, go outside, take responsibility for your health and stop enabling this medical authoritarianism. Enough,.

Absolutely ludicrous that this was ever a thing let alone still a thing in the glacially slow Japan!

At the beginning of the pandemic, when the disease had much more serious consequences frequently, and when the population was not immunized restrictions on visitations were justified, specially because a lot was unknown. Now the situation is completely different, and even for children vaccination is available to prevent infection on people without any immunity. Hospitals simply are abusing this rule to avoid taking responsibility for any problem that happens even when it has long unjustified to do it.

Unfortunately unaffected patients and their family many times push for these unreasonable measures as well in the misunderstanding that there is still a need, and will complain to hospitals that no longer restrict visits, which the hospitals happily try to use as a justification to avoid accepting visitations.

@Yrral

Maybe they should improve their health by going on a diet and getting a bit of exercise.

This is disgusting on the part of hospitals and care facilities.

From the time of the pandemic to until very recently, a friend of mine was not allowed to visit his elderly grandmother who has dementia for more than 15 minutes a month. The 15 minute restriction has finally been lifted but he still has to wear a mask and hand sanitise and get a temperature check before going in.

The ironic thing is after things calmed down and japan opened up again he demanded he allowed more visiting rights and kicked up a storm about it. A few weeks later he got a call from the hospital saying that grandma had got Covid from one of the nurses and they were apologetic. You can't make this stuff up.

The title and pictures are about covid, but supporting info is mostly about a doctor's wife's mother, who had cancer, people who are approaching the end of life, etc. If someone has had chemo, the risk of infection is high, as they have reduced immunity. Visitors ought to consider the patient and the situation. There is nothing wrong with taking someone's temperature, and sick visitors should self-select themselves out of visiting immune-compromised patients, but some people don't use common sense.

My student's mom gave birth two weeks ago, and they had to wait one week until she was released from the hospital to see their baby brother. The husband was not allowed to be with his wife during the delivery, even though it was a natural birth. That is insane!

There is nothing wrong with taking someone's temperature, and sick visitors should self-select themselves out of visiting immune-compromised patients, but some people don't use common sense.

But those machines are not even accurate. It's nonsense that Japan took to a totally new level. And by your logic all commuters should be temperature checked, masked and have to sanitize their hands before getting on a train or bus. 'Just in case' and 'for your own safety and the safety of others.' That's bordering on fascism.

During the actual pandemic, my wife was hospitalized in Tokyo for some intestinal issue that she could have died from. I wasn't allowed up to see her. I felt completely helpless. Sounds like they are still doing this.

NiftyToday  08:18 am JST

There is nothing wrong with taking someone's temperature, and sick visitors should self-select themselves out of visiting immune-compromised patients, but some people don't use common sense.

There is zero meaning in taking anyone’s temperature. Before corona, during corona and after corona. Most idiotic ”measure” ever deviced. For corona, 75% of infections were unasymptotic there for any tests or checks were useless in preventing anything.

They locked people in rooms, denied care based on experimental intravenous "medicine" status, and traumatized entire generations in the name of "safety."

False accusations work much more to the benefit of hospitals that want to keep unreasonable measures, after all they can deny it saying the complains are about false things like "experimental intravenous medicines" and they can get an easy way out.

A few weeks later he got a call from the hospital saying that grandma had got Covid from one of the nurses and they were apologetic.

This kind of admission is extremely rare and almost unheard in Japan, not only because it is realistically impossible to eliminate other possibilities of transmission (like other visitors or patients) but because it opens a way to legal responsibilities that can even make a small hospital go broke.

But those machines are not even accurate. 

You can bring your thermometer to any hospital and they will accept the measure you consider accurate.

And by your logic all commuters should be temperature checked, masked and have to sanitize their hands before getting on a train or bus. 

Trains or buses are not places where immune compromised patients are being isolated for their own safety.

There is zero meaning in taking anyone’s temperature

That being asymptomatic do not eliminate the possibility of being infected do not make the measurement useless, after all fever has a very high specificity, meaning that people without fever may still transmit the disease, but those that actually have a fever (of cough, etc.) are a clear positive for risk.

The lack of basic medical knowledge posted in these comments is scary.

The doctor with the mother in law with cancer should put a lawsuit on that hospital. It's the only way to begin changes in a "stuck in time Japan." He's an expert in the subject and he's got the evidence and went thru the ordeal of the stuck in time Japan COVID restrictions. Sadly, the only way to bring changes in Japan is to publicly name and shame.

Healthy people still wearing masks, hospitals continuing with restrictions it's ridiculous now

And was ridiculous for all but the first few months of the virus

The Covid pandemic is over. At this time it is no more a threat than the flu. Hospitals that are still sticking to their Pandemic era policies must lift them.

I hope these doctors and medical professionals raise bloody hell to get this changed.

Japan is a country where some things just won't change because no one wants to take any responsibility. The J-govt needs to implement and force a change.

Healthy people still wearing masks, hospitals continuing with restrictions it's ridiculous now

And was ridiculous for all but the first few months of the virus

That was the time when you couldn't get masks for love or money! The response was amazingly slow. Then, when they did come available, Abe, using a large lump of our taxpayer money, sent out masks that were so tiny that most people couldn't use them.

Nothing changes. Just more knee jerk!

And what is it with all you readers agreeing with restrictions? You're worse than Trump and RFK combined.

The article is talking about unreasonable, unsupported measures, but there are others that are perfectly justified. Taking care of keeping immunocompromised patients isolated from infection is not unreasonable, this is not like you have to use all measures or else none.

Healthy people still wearing masks

There is nothing wrong with that, people noticed that wearing masks on crowded spaces made them avoid at least some of the yearly cold or flu and liked it. For people that can't afford to miss work or waste sick days this is a very reasonable measure.

It's ridiculous. Can't visit my widowed, childless neighbor because we're not family. I think they just don't want to bother with visitors coming. Covid is just an excuse!

Can you bring any respected institution of medicine or science in any country of the world that support this claim? 

No? that is because this claim is false, the measures are recognized as based on clear scientific evidence and saved millions of lives.

Absolute nonsense. The measures didn’t “save millions of lives.” They destroyed millions of livelihoods, crushed civil liberties, and infantilized entire populations. They were responsible were effects far greater than the virus itself.

Johns Hopkins University Meta-analysis:

Lockdowns had “little to no effect” on COVID mortality and caused enormous societal harm.

https://sites.krieger.jhu.edu/iae/files/2022/01/A-Literature-Review-and-Meta-Analysis-of-the-Effects-of-Lockdowns-on-COVID-19-Mortality.pdf

Let people breath again! The problem with Power once gained it's really hard to give it up, not only here in Japan but globally. Just revisit historical incidents such as pandemics, economic recessions, floods, fires and you find the policies or laws adopted then to help the people get through the situation are still in place today.

 saying rules are rules.

There it is.

Aren't those general infection control measures being practiced even before covid?

If so, those practices helped prevent loss of lives when covid arrived

How many hospitals have excessive restrictions?

Absolute nonsense. The measures didn’t “save millions of lives.”

I challenged this claim specifically, yet you still have not brought any institution of science that support this personal belief of you, that means you could not find any, in any country in the world. What is easier to believe that the full scientific and medical communities of the world are wrong even when they routinely present evidence for their conclusions? or that one nameless person in the internet is wrong as proved by his complete lack of evidence?

I mean, you hade to reduce yourself to a well debunked "study" written by an economist and plagued by mistakes and obvious manipulations is not evidence, if anything this is only evidence that you could not find any actual evidence. This is literally years being debunked, not surprising since the whole excercise is getting almost 20,000 reports and eliminating systematically those that reported any benefit until they could get those papers that supposedly proved the claim and were the only included, a grand total of 24...

https://foreignpolicy.com/2022/02/08/economists-are-fueling-the-war-against-public-health/

The 62-page study, much-hailed by leading Republican politicians, has grabbed mainstream media headlines, as well. But closer scrutiny reveals that it is an example of motivated reasoning, indulging in scientific cherry-picking to prove a preferred thesis about public health.

Now a group of physicians and social workers is demanding the restrictions be abolished or curbed, calling them a violation of human rights.

The government measures were always a violation of human rights. from day one.

The_Beagle

Today 12:06 pm JST

Now a group of physicians and social workers is demanding the restrictions be abolished or curbed, calling them a violation of human rights.

> The government measures were always a violation of human rights. from day one.

Hahaha you mean the govt should have done nothing?

At least 18 people think there should be covid hospital restrictions. No accounting for them then.

 Japan appears to be stuck in time

Yes, with so many things.

The government measures were always a violation of human rights. from day one.

Human rights conventions are not for ordinary times, when everyone agrees about them. They are for "emergencies", when tyrants attempt to take them away.

When measures are well supported in scientific evidence and are proved to reduce the risks for populations the criticism as "violations of human rights" are not valid. That only apply when they can be proved to be irrational and with a much higher cost than the benefits produced as in the article.

The blanked disqualification would make it also a violation to "force" people working on kitchens to wash their hands, even if they believe microbes don't exist or that soap is bad for their health.

At least 18 people think there should be covid hospital restrictions. No accounting for them then.

There should be rational covid (and other infectious diseases) hospital restrictions, that is not even remotely the same to justify anything and everything just because it is called anti-covid.

sanjinosebleed:

Absolutely ludicrous that this was ever a thing let alone still a thing in the glacially slow Japan!

There was a time and place for masks despite what you think what's happening now. Probably explains why over a million 'freedom-loving' Americans died.

However, I do agree the situation in Japan now is over-the-loop. My biggest complaint was when they banned PRs from coming back to Japan. Many of us will not forget that insane rule which separated families.

Unlike many other countries, Covid19 deaths in Japan has gradually increased from 2020 to 2022, its situation remains high until now 2025.

But, this country socially behave as if Covid19 was ended, medical and care facilities cannot but respond it independently, it makes gap among facilities.

And, what is worse, there are part of doctors believing as if Covid19 deaths is "natural selection" in Japan.

Ironically, just recently Covid cases are taking off in places like China and Taiwan, so cases will surely be surging in Japan, if not so already.

Like the idea of letting 'terminal' patients go outside to visit with family, get some much-needed sunshine etc.

This year in Japan (excluding foreigners), there will be approx. 3 JN deaths for every 1 JN birth and in approx. ten years it'll be approx. 9 deaths to 1 birth if one believes actuarial science = more and more elderly will need to be visited before departing.

Aren't those general infection control measures being practiced even before covid?

Medical institutes in many countries devised plans in case of pandemic, but those plans were all ignored when C19 appeared.

There was no solid rationale for the new measures. And the narrative that these measures saved millions of lives is based on severely inflated models.

Medical institutes in many countries devised plans in case of pandemic, but those plans were all ignored when C19 appeared.

Mostly because of the negative influence of antiscientific groups, that is why in countries like Japan where those groups had no real power the plans were implemented with much more ease.

There was no solid rationale for the new measures. And the narrative that these measures saved millions of lives is based on severely inflated models.

That is not the opinion of the experts, none have identified any problem with the assumptions and methods of the models, that the measures have saved millions of lives in the world is a well accepted conclusion in medical and scientific circles.

VirusRex

That being asymptomatic do not eliminate the possibility of being infected do not make the measurement useless, after all fever has a very high specificity, meaning that people without fever may still transmit the disease, but those that actually have a fever (of cough, etc.) are a clear positive for risk.

You do understand that there are a million over the counter medicine you can take to reduce fever? Just take 2 ibuprofein before you want to enter a venue with ”temperature checks” and you will always pass.

Same for the airport ”screening”.

In other words, completely meaningless.

You do understand that there are a million over the counter medicine you can take to reduce fever?

And again that does nothing about this being useful to eliminate those that do have a fever, for your point to be valid it would be needed for the temperature check to reduce the number of people that are detected as infected. It is not meaningless just because some people will want to cheat it and put their relatives (and every other immunocompromised patient in the hospital) at risk, most people would not even consider doing this.

Hahaha you mean the govt should have done nothing?

Yes, exactly.

Those doctors are wrong.

Rules are rules

And then trying to create loops and holes to try and overcome these rules without breaking them.. even if it is less 安全 and is infinitely more 面倒 than just breaking them.

That is probably the most japanese thing ever...

If a loved one is dying, the priority should be dignity — not outdated protocols. Denying a terminal patient the chance to see their own grandchild isn’t ‘safety,’ it’s cruelty. Infection control matters, but empathy must come first.

I'm sure there are some hospital rules that have remained from early days that are not completely necessary. But guess what, hospitals remain a major place of Covid infections in places/countries where doctors and patients do not mask (I saw a stat that said about 80% of people with Covid in hospitals I think in the UK got it from in the hospital), and another major Covid wave is starting to surge in Asia, meaning soon in other countries as well. Japanese medical workers tend to mask (I don't know if they are required to or just out of habit), but I would say require masks for workers and visitors of patients (really anyone in hospitals should be wearing them), clean the air in hospitals, and things like visitations should be fine.