A panel of experts is planning to urge the Japanese government to suspend its Go To Travel campaign for some areas where novel coronavirus infections are spreading, it was learned Thursday.

The panel, headed by Shigeru Omi, chief of the government-affiliated Japan Community Health Care Organization, will formalize the proposal after holding a meeting on Friday, government sources said.

At the meeting, the panel plans to divide areas in a coronavirus situation equivalent to Stage 3, the second-worst level on the four-tier scale to measure the seriousness of the epidemic, into three–areas where infections are starting to decrease, areas where the number of infections remains at high levels and areas where the spread of infections is continuing.

The panel will propose that the tourism promotion campaign be temporarily halted for areas with high levels of infections and those with the continuing spread of infections, according to the sources.

At an off-session meeting of a parliamentary committee on Wednesday, Omi called for the Go To Travel campaign to be suspended for areas in a coronavirus situation equivalent to Stage 3. But the government of Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga is keen to continue the program, aimed at supporting the tourism industry, which has been hit hard by the coronavirus fallout.

JIJ Press