TOKYO: A total of 1,534 new cases of novel coronavirus infection were confirmed across Japan on August 1, with the daily tally topping 1,500 for the second consecutive day following a record 1,581 cases registered the previous day.

The daily number exceeded 1,000 for the fourth straight day.

In Tokyo, 472 people tested positive for the virus, rewriting the record high for the third consecutive day.

Record high numbers of infection were found in Saitama Prefecture, north of Tokyo, with 74 cases, Chiba Prefecture, east of Tokyo, with 73, Nara Prefecture, western Japan, with 19, Nagasaki

Prefecture, southwestern Japan, with 13, and Mie Prefecture, central Japan, with 11.

The central prefecture of Aichi reported its second-highest number of 181 cases, while the western prefecture of Osaka logged 195, its third highest.

According to the Tokyo metropolitan government, people in their 20s and 30s accounted for 324 cases, or nearly 70 pct of the total in the Japanese capital. People in their 60s or older, who are at higher risk of developing severe symptoms, totaled 35. Fifteen people are showing severe symptoms.

Many patients in Tokyo were infected with the virus when they dined or traveled with friends during the four-day weekend through last Sunday.

Fifty patients are suspected of having been infected at their homes. Infection sources were not identified for 305 people, about two-thirds of the total.

In Chiba Prefecture, cluster infections of 14 people were confirmed at two facilities offering daytime karaoke sing-along services in Sakura.

Infection cluster was also found at a club with live music and a hospital in Sapporo, Hokkaido, northernmost Japan, and at a day care center in Sendai, Miyagi Prefecture, northeastern Japan.

The Tottori prefectural government in western Japan said that two of four infection cases reported on Friday were a man in his 40s and a woman in her 30s who are staff writers for Shin Nihonkai Shimbun, a local daily publisher. The two work at the same workplace as another man in his 40s who was confirmed to be infected on July 30.

JIJI Press