NewsDesk @bactiman63

The Tokyo Metropolitan Government reported the second most COVID-19 cases in a single day on Thursday with 4,989 cases. This number is down just 53 from the record number just one week ago.

Image by PIRO4D from Pixabay

The seven day average in the city is 3,976, up 109 percent from the week prior.

In addition, six fatalities were reported.

To date, 263,970 people have been confirmed to be infected in Tokyo.

Nationally, the health ministry reports two-thirds of Japan’s prefectures are experiencing an explosion of novel coronavirus infections.

According to guidelines used by experts to classify infection-spread levels, 31 of Japan’s 47 prefectures were at the most serious stage 4, which indicates an “explosive growth” in infections.

The experts’ panel has set 25 cases per 100,000 residents as the cutoff line for designating a prefecture as being in stage 4.

Among the prefectures with extremely high ratios were Okinawa at 86.3 percent, Shiga at 81 percent, Fukushima at 79.2 percent and Kanagawa at 69.1 percent.

Since the beginning of the pandemic, Japan has recorded a total of 1,090,265 COVID-19 cases, including 15, 371 deaths.