Commentary: Maskless vacationers in Japan set off debate over ‘face underwear’

TOKYO: With the borders finally open, foreigners arriving in Japan are noticing some issues listed here are completely different. Eating out is a cut price, due to comparatively low inflation and the weak yen. As soon as-familiar areas at the moment are unrecognisable due to a constructing growth. And mask-wearing continues to be nearly ubiquitous, even open air.

The Japanese public nonetheless prefers to masks up, regardless of elevated prodding from the federal government to let their guard down somewhat. For a lot of guests from the West, for whom masks have turn into a long-abandoned battleground within the tradition wars, it may be barely disorientating.

The sensation is mutual. The return of reluctant-to-mask vacationers is triggering inner debate on Japan’s outlier standing. From day one, the nation has largely adopted its personal pandemic playbook – eschewing lockdowns, mass testing and vaccine mandates in favor of a low-tech, frequent sense method.

Regardless of by no means ordering masks sporting, encouraging their use in nearly all social conditions was a core a part of this plan. The inhabitants was conversant in masks since lengthy earlier than COVID-19: It was thought-about well mannered to put on one when sick, whereas tens of millions extra wore them in hay fever season.

Throughout the pandemic, masks have turn into such an integral a part of society that they’ve been nicknamed “kao pantsu,” or face underwear – such is the concept of being caught with out one.

ATTITUDES ON FACE MASKS ARE CHANGING

As foreigners return in droves, some Japanese fret that maskless vacationers will assist set off one other surge in infections.

Others argue that Japan as a substitute ought to use the chance to mimic the West’s abandoning of masks, with face-coverings alone failing to stem a record-breaking COVID-19 wave this summer time. Implicit within the criticism is a sense that Japan is lagging the remainder of the world, clinging to outmoded strategies others have already dropped.