The government will accelerate efforts at the National Center for Global Health and Medicine and other institutes to develop treatments for patients in serious condition. It also plans to call on every prefecture to set up outpatient facilities for people suspected of being infected, and provide necessary financial support.

Also included in the measures are plans to develop simple diagnostic test kits, antiviral drugs and vaccines, in cooperation with private companies, to establish preventive measures, diagnosis and treatment methods.

The government plans to address the economic impact of the outbreak, as tourism and some other industries have been hit by a decline in the number of travelers from China. It plans financial measures worth about 4.5 billion dollars to support small and medium-sized firms.

The government will assist firms that plan to urgently invest in production facilities to offset stalled supplies of industrial products from China. It also plans to pay expenses for diagnostic tests conducted for people who returned from the Chinese city of Wuhan to Japan by chartered planes, as well as passengers and crewmembers of a cruise ship quarantined at Yokohama Port.

Reserve funds for the current fiscal year will be used to cover these expenditures.

The government is set to approve the measures at a meeting of a task force dealing with the virus outbreak on Thursday afternoon.