Japan will soon provide 38 countries with the anti-flu drug Avigan, which is seen as a potential treatment for COVID-19.
Foreign Minister Motegi Toshimitsu says the countries, which includes the Netherlands, the Philippines and Malaysia, will receive the anti-flu drug developed by a Japanese company.
Japan's health ministry has allowed dentists to carry out coronavirus tests when physicians and other qualified health care personnel are not available.
The ministry notified local governments that they can have dentists conduct PCR tests at local coronavirus testing centers as a special measure.
Japan's Defense Ministry plans to draw up procedures in the event Self-Defense Force pilots encounter unidentified flying objects, or UFOs.
The US Defense Department on Monday released videos of what it claims to be UFOs racing through the sky.
The number of confirmed coronavirus cases in Japan increased to 13,613 on Monday as 172 new cases were reported nationwide.
The tally includes people tested at airport quarantine stations, health ministry officials, quarantine officers and individuals who returned to Japan from China on government-chartered planes. It also includes infections among the crew of the Costa Atlantica cruise ship docked at a port in Nagasaki, western Japan.
Japan's annual summer inter-high school athletic meet has been cancelled due to the spread of coronavirus.
This is the first cancelation of the national sports event since it began in 1963.
A group of doctors in Japan is set to begin a clinical trial of a blood plasma treatment for the coronavirus.
The group from the National Center for Global Health and Medicine was given an official go-ahead by the center's ethics committee on Thursday.
TOKYO — Nissan plans to slash the number of cars it produces at home in May by 78% from last year, as the impact of the coronavirus shakes the troubled automaker which has already been struggling with falling sales.
As global automakers reel from plunging sales amid lockdowns imposed in many countries to curb the spread of the virus, the hit is particularly severe for Nissan, whose profitability has been deteriorating as it grapples with the turmoil that followed the ousting of former Chairman Carlos Ghosn.
The Japanese government has decided to deny the entry of foreign nationals from an additional 14 countries to step up its coronavirus measures at ports of entry.
The government made the decision at a taskforce meeting on Monday. It will ban the entry of non-Japanese citizens who have been in Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Oman, Djibouti, Peru, the Dominican Republic, Antigua and Barbuda, Saint Christopher and Nevis, and Barbados within 14 days before their arrival in Japan. The ban will take effect on Wednesday.
Mobile phone data in Japan suggests people in major cities are largely complying with the government's request that they stay home.
Telecoms company NTT Docomo has released anonymous tracking data. It shows that under the nationwide state of emergency, average outings in major cities on Saturday declined compared with the period between mid-January and mid-February.
An NHK survey has found that nearly 10 percent of people infected with the coronavirus in Japan are believed to have contracted the pathogen inside hospitals and other medical institutions.
As of Tuesday, the total of confirmed and suspected cases of hospital infections stood at 1,086, across 60 medical institutions nationwide.
The Japanese government is moving a step closer to the introduction of antibody tests that would identify people who have been infected with the new coronavirus.
Health minister Kato Katsunobu said on Friday his ministry has begun checking the performance of several test kits that could be used to see the existence of coronavirus antibodies in blood samples.
The number of confirmed coronavirus cases in Japan stood at 12,480 on Friday.
The tally includes people tested at airport quarantine stations, health ministry officials, quarantine officers and individuals who returned to Japan from China on government-chartered planes.
Health officials in Japan say more than 430 new cases and 29 deaths were reported on Thursday. The total number of confirmed cases is now over 12,000.
This does not include 712 cases linked to the Diamond Princess cruise ship, which was quarantined near Tokyo in February.
Officials in southwestern Japan are dealing with a coronavirus outbreak on a cruise ship that was undergoing repairs in Nagasaki.
So far 127 of the 623 crew members on the Costa Atlantica have been tested. Of those, 48 have tested positive...including a man in his 40s who is being treated with a ventilator.