Reporter’s Notebook: Tokyo Is in Danger

It feels surreal. With the recent March 20 equinox, spring had arrived in Japan’s capital. In Shinjuku Central Park, in the renowned commercial and administrative center of Tokyo, about a dozen parents with kids visited the playground while many sat and looked at the blooming cherry blossoms. Only half of them wore masks.

As the new coronavirus strikes fear into the rest of the world, in Japan, “hygiene fatigue” is instead taking hold, and with it, Tokyo’s epidemic situation is worsening.