Interesting. One man, Kenji Shibuya, has been very busy giving interviews to several overseas news outlets saying Japan’s COVID-19 strategy is a failure. NYT, BBC, Süddeutsche Zeitung, France 24, Tages Anzeiger, etc. https://twitter.com/tsukuru_ouu/status/1259097942381563904

I wrote about him a bit in this thread a while back. https://twitter.com/makiwi/status/1251994291716665344

He’s now offering economic advice to Japan, from his totally much safer abode in London. Busy guy. https://r.nikkei.com/article/DGXMZO58858110Y0A500C2CR0000?s=4

Whenever I’m uncertain about an “expert’s” credentials I look up what papers they’ve published. He has a lot re:heart disease and obesity, I don’t see anything about infectious diseases or viruses.
https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=iUP9914AAAAJ&hl=en

Let’s compare that to the papers published by Dr Nishiura, aka “Uncle 80%”, probably the most visible medical expert in Japan atm
https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=toSTNkkAAAAJ&hl=en

To conclude:
- Everyone has an agenda and an axe to grind
- News media really need to try to at least get the views of more than one person, as well as check the backgrounds of self styled “experts”.