Japan to ease COVID-19 guidelines for mask-wearing on March 13

17 comments

1. Love to see it

2. I don’t really see this changing much minus the airlines as there was never a mandate and businesses self enforced mask rules. Maybe some multi national companies will drop no mask no service but I don’t see smaller or companies that operate only in Japan following suit.

3. People in Asian countries have always said “this is the moment the masks start going away” for a long while now. This happened last summer in Korea and Japan: “with the mandate gone (or no mandate at all in Japan’s case, but the government outright advising people not to mask outdoors in certain environments), they’ll definitely stop wearing it this summer because of the heat!” Lo and behold, 95% still masked outdoors in the peak of summer heat.

   The masks aren’t going away. It’s been three years. They’re a permanent cultural fixture at this point for at least the remainder of the 2020s. The talking points regarding masks in Japan have already been shifting from health reasons to cultural and politeness reasons for a while now. Once it’s treated as cultural rather than for temporary health based reasons, it becomes that much harder to stop doing.

4. I’m particularly curious about gyms – does anyone know if this means gyms will go mask optional around mid March? Or can they still legally mandate masks if they want? I’d really like to go back to workouts without a mask.

5. Actually went to a cafe yesterday, they had a sign saying “Masks not required”, first time I’ve ever seen that sign in Tokyo, all the staff were mask-less, some people hate it, I rather enjoyed it.

6. When will they cut off not doing PCR test for incoming tourists?

7. I just hope it changes for schools and kids the most. It is sad to me that kids are forced to be silent during lunch time and that my son never really saw his teachers’ faces much for his three years at kindergarten.

8. Mask wearing was popular in Japan before COVID and it’ll be popular after.

9. Yes! Still, my work might take a few more months but I welcome any hints of normalcy in the horizon.

10. When have mask rules ever existed? They’ve always been rule suggestions. People in general just follow them instead of whining about their rights, is all.

    Doubt anything will change.

11. Huh, reading this thread…I thought masking in public was the done thing for decades before covid.

12. That’s a hell of a birthday present

13. How would this affect big shopping malls like AEON Mall?

    I suppose they will set their own mask rules? But I’d also guess they just might follow the government guidelines?

14. My boss told me today that he still expects mask at work. Even after corona is changed as the same status as influenza.

15. There may be a trickle down effect if people on tv stop wearing those ridiculous face shields when they are filming outdoors. Right now, mask wearing has become so entrenched I agree with many commenters that it won’t be going away any time soon because of social anxiety. If there’s any change, it’ll be younger people removing them before the summer IMO.

16. Cool, it’s not going to change anything at my school where we tightened activity restrictions again. No recorder playing and no talking loud. Lol

17. Hopefully this will take effect for gyms as well.