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The Japanese government's coronavirus advisory panel plans to urge more restraint during the year-end and New Year holidays in areas where infections are surging.

The panel members plan to have a meeting on Friday during which they will make proposals. They will call on people in areas where infections have reached Stage 3, the second-worst level on a 4-tier scale, to move their parties online and to reconsider visiting their hometowns.

Japan's government says it will not ask people to refrain from visiting their hometowns during the mid-summer "bon" holidays altogether, but will call on them to take anti-coronavirus measures to protect the elderly.

The minister in charge of the coronavirus response, Nishimura Yasutoshi, said at a news conference on Wednesday that people will have increased chances of meeting the elderly as well as eating and drinking with them during their hometown visits. He called on people to avoid dining in large groups and to take other anti-infection measures during the holidays.

Authorities in Japan are racing to contain a surge in coronavirus infections, ahead of upcoming summer holidays. Tokyo remains the major hotspot. Metropolitan government officials confirmed 258 new cases in the capital on Monday.

It's the seventh consecutive day with more than 200 infections. Across the country, the total number of infections has topped 40,000.

The coronavirus shows no signs of a summer slowdown in Japan as the upward trend continues. Officials are turning a worried eye to the season's upcoming holidays.

Prime Minister Abe Shinzo is calling on people to keep taking thorough measures against the virus.

A major Japanese cell-phone carrier has found that trips between prefectures during the holiday period from the end of April to early May were significantly down from last year.

KDDI examined data from users' smartphones for the spring holiday period that ended on May 6. During this period, people were urged to stay home amid concerns over the coronavirus outbreak.

Japan's Prime Minister Abe Shinzo has repeated his call for people to avoid travel during the upcoming holidays, to prevent the spread of the coronavirus from urban to rural areas.

Abe was speaking at a news conference on Friday, one day after a state of emergency over the coronavirus outbreak was expanded nationwide. The declaration had covered Tokyo, Osaka and five other prefectures.