OKAYAMA: Okayama Governor Ryuta Ibaragi said Monday that the western Japan prefecture will cancel its leg of the Tokyo Olympics torch relay on public roads.

“It is very unfortunate, but we determined that conducting the relay on local public roads would be impossible” due to the continuing spread of the novel coronavirus in the prefecture, he told reporters in the city of Okayama, the prefecture’s capital. The torch relay in Okayama Prefecture has been scheduled for May 19-20.

Most of the mayors of the 12 municipalities the Olympic flame was slated to pass through agreed with the prefectural government’s cancellation plan. “It is regrettable that we effectively won’t be able to host the torch relay, but the decision was unavoidable in view of the current (coronavirus) situation,” the governor added.

The prefecture reported 189 new cases of novel coronavirus infection on Saturday, marking its highest daily tally. The occupancy rate for hospital beds for coronavirus patients in the prefecture stood at 71.6 percent as of Sunday, exceeding the level for Stage 4, the worst on the country’s four-tier coronavirus alert system.

“The infection situation in our prefecture is almost equivalent to a state of emergency,” Ibaragi said.

The prefecture is currently in talks with the central government to seek pre-emergency designation over the epidemic.

JIJI Press