Japan is a really interesting case in the course of the covid saga, and you have to look at the pre-vaccine numbers to see why. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-

Japan is a really interesting case in the course of the covid saga, and you have to look at the pre-vaccine numbers to see why. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-53188847 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-53188847 July 2020 """ Many paragons of Covid strategy, such as New Zealand and Vietnam, used tough measures including closing borders, tight lockdowns, large-scale testing and strict quarantines - but Japan did none of that. Yet, five months after the first Covid case was reported here, Japan has fewer than 20,000 confirmed cases and fewer than 1,000 deaths. The state of emergency has been lifted, and life is rapidly returning to normal. But there is no doubt that many Japanese, and some scientists, think there is something about Japan that is different - a so called "Factor X" that is protecting the population from Covid-19. Tokyo University professor Tatsuhiko Kodama - who studies how Japanese patients react to the virus - believes Japan may have had Covid before. Not Covid-19, but something similar that could have left behind "historical immunity". He thinks it is possible a Sars-like virus has circulated in the region before, which may account for the low death rate, not just in Japan, but in much of China, South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong and South East Asia. """